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Malema hearing postponed

ANC Youth League leader Julius Malema's disciplinary hearing for bringing the ruling party into disrepute has been postponed to next Tuesday.

"The NDC (national disciplinary committee) has not completed its work today and consequently it will reconvene next week, Tuesday, the 11 May, 2010.

"We also like to confirm that the ANC Treasurer General, cde Mathews Phosa is the representative of cde Julius Malema on his disciplinary hearing," the ANC said in a statement yesterday.

As a veil of secrecy covered the proceedings ANCYL spokesperson Floyd Shivambu pleaded ignorance with the media yesterday saying he was not aware of a disciplinary hearing against Malema.

ANC spokesperson Jackson Mthembu confirmed the hearing took place yesterday but could not complete its work.

He confirmed that ANC treasurer-general Mathews Phosa, represented Malema.

Deputy Minister of Science and Technology Derek Hanekom chaired the hearing amid suggestions by some party leaders that there was no longer a strong appetite for disciplining Malema.

Suggestions that President Jacob Zuma accepted and "understood" the explanation submitted by the youth league about the context in which Malema compared Zuma to his predecessor, Thabo Mbeki, isolated ANC general secretary Gwede Mantashe as the only person pursuing a hearing against Malema.

A submission by the league also convinced the ANC officials that Malema and the ANCYL's visit to Zimbabwe was not an assault on Zuma's efforts to intervene in the political impasse in that country.

Sources in the ANCYL suggested Mantashe was the only one who was still adamant that Malema should be charged.

Mantashe and the league are on a collision course following reports that the league was campaigning for the removal of the general secretary at the next ANC conference in 2012.

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