Tenders plump and delicious

Justice Malala: There are many people out there who are wondering what they need to do to get rich as quickly as ANC Youth League president Julius Malema has. As was reported in various media, Malema's companies have made a staggering R130-million from government tenders in a mere two years.

If Malema and his partners were charging a management fee of 25%, they are sitting on a cool R32.5-million. Not bad for two years' work.

For those of you who want to make the same amounts, or more, with no expertise in any field, this column was written for you. Here is how it is done:

First, you need to join your nearest ANC branch. This is very easy. To find out the details, phone the ANC on 011-376-1000. They will put you in touch with your branch and someone will promptly sign you up.

There are no barriers to entry: the ANC wants to sign up as many members as possible and everyone is allowed in.

From here on make sure you attend branch meetings so you can identify who the leaders are, and who in the branch is opposed to the sitting branch leaders.

The next step is to ensure you attend the next annual general meeting of the branch, where you need to raise your hand frequently and make a lot of noise.

If you have some money, buy as many poor people as possible branch membership and make sure they attend the annual general meeting. This way you ensure that you get elected into the branch executive committee.

If you are in a relatively large town such as Polokwane, being on the branch executive committee means you have begun your ride on the gravy train. If you are in a small village somewhere in a godforsaken part of the country, you will need to put in extra work.

From your branch executive committee position, you need to be elected into the regional executive. To do this you may need to lead a service delivery protest in your village or township. You need to agitate against regional ANC leaders, who happen to be sitting as district mayors and councillors.

Once the people believe the leaders are the cause of poor service delivery, tyres will be burnt and all sorts of mayhem will be caused. The national ANC leadership will send in a "task team" that will get rid of the leaders and demand the democratic election of new regional leaders.

Because the rioters will have been organised by you, you will make it into this new "legitimate" leadership structure.

This is what happened in Pretoria, where the ANC leadership has already kicked out the municipal manager and is trying to oust mayor Gwen Ramokgopa. The aim, ultimately, is for them to instal their "own people" into these positions - very soon tenders and other largesse from the council will come through.

When you are at this point of your ANC career, you need to be very careful. Do not become a mayor or municipal employee. Simply become very powerful in the party - with easy access to the deployment committee - and then register companies in your name and your friends' names. This power will ensure that municipal tenders begin flowing to your companies.

Plus, you don't need to declare anything. After all, you are a private citizen, not a public representative.

To make hundreds of millions, you need to aim higher.

One way is to fight tooth and nail - as Malema did - for the leadership of a national structure of the ANC. In Malema's case, there were physical fights at the conference that elected him. Things got so bad the conference was abandoned.

These are battles you may need to fight to get to wealth. But when you have won them, the road is clear for serious looting.

Say, for example, you become known as a person on the winning side of the ANC leadership, as Malema is. Then your Range Rover Sport can arrive in a town like Polokwane and political office bearers will prostrate themselves before you.

Your reputation will be of someone who can whisper in the ear of the premier - mayors could lose their jobs if they don't co-operate with you. When you indicate that certain tenders should be reserved for certain companies, this will be done.

This, my dear friends, is how to make R130-million in two years. It is as easy as saying "banana republic".

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