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'We will support Zuma until death do us part': MKMVA heads to Nkandla

Amanda Khoza Presidency reporter
Former president Jacob Zuma.
Former president Jacob Zuma.
Image: Veli Nhlapo

The Umkhonto we Sizwe Military Veterans Association (MKMVA) will visit former president Jacob Zuma at Nkandla on Thursday to show their unwavering support for his defiance campaign.

“As MKMVA, we had taken a resolution a long time ago in 2007 that we will support him up until death do us part because we feel very strong that he has been a target,” MKMVA president Kebby Maphatsoe said on Tuesday.

Their visit comes a few days after EFF leader Julius Malema and his delegation met Zuma over tea. Sources close to the meeting, which the EFF described as “nice, hot and sweet”, said it was planned in advance.

Sources told the Sunday Times the meeting — facilitated by staunch Zuma supporters Ekurhuleni mayor Mzwandile Masina and former Nelson Mandela Bay councillor Andile Lungisa — was part of a strategy pursued by “progressive forces” led by a faction opposing President Cyril Ramaphosa’s leadership.

Zuma was also reportedly advised about the serious implications of his decision not to appear before the Zondo commission. The meeting took place during a week when Zuma said he would defy a Constitutional Court ruling that ordered him to appear before and answer questions put to him by the commission. Zuma dared the commission to arrest him.

Maphatsoe said, “Last month we had our normal national executive committee meeting and we discussed the challenges facing former president Jacob Zuma, who is the patron in chief of MKMVA and a member of the MKMVA.”

He said Zuma briefed the MKMVA in 2006 “that the foreign intelligence forces have a plan and they have said that Zuma must never ascend to any senior position or presidency in the ANC - and so the only thing they can do to deal with him is to deal with his character”.

“So this is a plan we knew from 1990, when we had a consultative conference and they wanted to launch that thing, in 1990. Unfortunately ... their plan collapsed and then in 1991 that is why he was elected the deputy secretary-general of the ANC.”

Maphatsoe said this “agenda of destroying [former] president Jacob Zuma’s character, has been implemented in many ways, like the #ZumaMustFall campaign - all of those campaigns are from that agenda”.

He said people who were presenting evidence at the state capture inquiry were wasting their time. “It is very clear that the agenda, the outcome of the commission, is that Zuma must be the face of corruption and a useless leader. That is the intention.”

He said there was no agenda for the Nkandla meeting.

“It is an open-agenda meeting. We will discuss also the state of the ANC and how can we unite the ANC. We will also show our support that we are with him, we know that there is this campaign and that is why there is an all-out media campaign to make president Jacob Zuma seem like he is against the constitution.”

TimesLIVE

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