Julius Malema

Julius Malema

Julius Sello Malema (born 3 March 1981) is a South African politician, and the former president of the African National Congress Youth League. Malema occupies a notably controversial position in South African public and political life; having risen to prominence with his support for African National Congress president, and later President of South Africa, Jacob Zuma. He has been described by both Zuma and the Premier of Limpopo Province as the "future leader" of South Africa. Less favourable portraits paint him as a "reckless populist" with the potential to destabilise South Africa and to spark racial conflict.

He was convicted of hate speech in March 2010 and again in September 2011. In November 2011 he was found guilty of sowing divisions within the ANC and, in conjunction with his two-year suspended sentence in May 2010, was suspended from the party for five years. In 2011, he was also convicted of hate speech after calling for the murder of white people. On 4 February 2012 the appeal committee of the African National Congress announced that it found no reason to "vary" a decision of the disciplinary committee taken in 2011, but did find evidence in aggravation of circumstances, leading them to impose the harsher sentence of expulsion from the ANC. On 25 April 2012 Malema lost an appeal to have his expulsion from the ANC overturned, as this exhausted his final appeal, his expulsion took immediate effect. In September 2012 he was charged with fraud and moneylaundering. He appeared before the Polokwane Magistrates Court in November 2012 to face these charges, plus an additional charge of racketeering. The case was postponed to 23 April 2013.