Make-believe militant

JULIUS Malema turned 31 yesterday but did not have much to celebrate. His political career has dimmed, his world has changed and what once looked like a promising future can now be seen as a "tale full of sound and fury".

The wayward leader of the ANC Youth League has age on his side and could easily re-invent himself - although perhaps not inside the ANC. The mother body expelled him but, before putting a full stop on his obituary, it afforded him an opportunity to appeal against his expulsion.

In throwing him these lifelines, it is showing that Malema has been given every avenue to fight for his survival.

As he contemplates his next move, I am sure his own words are ringing in his head. Does he remember taunting those who had defected to COPE, warning them that "it is cold outside the ANC?"

An exploration of Malema's psyche would make for a riveting psychology treatise. His nostalgia for the struggle and fantasies of a revolution are most bizarre. It is almost as if he feels that being born in 1981 deprived him of an opportunity to be a hero.

Here is a young man who came onto the scene in the dying days of apartheid, when South Africa was no longer burning - and thus missed an opportunity to save his people.

He was eight, almost nine, when Nelson Mandela was released and, even though the period after the unbanning of the ANC was marked by violence, he was too young to play any decisive role in the decisions of that time. Instead, he hung around older members of the ANC and hitched rides to rallies and funerals. But this inconsequential role in the struggle was not enough to quench his thirst for an epic battle that would secure his name in the annals of history.

The Malema story is tragic. I have no doubt his love for the ANC is genuine and deep.

But he should have known that sometimes our critics can be our greatest saviours.

As we travel this journey of life, it is not our praise singers who will bring out the best in us, but those who tell us we are wrong. Maybe he should have listened to them, as they may have saved him.

How sad that, instead of chastising and schooling him in the ways of the movement to which he swore allegiance, senior ANC leaders propped him up, stroked his ego and made him believe he was a messianic figure whose presence would shake our political landscape.

And now the same people who fed his romantic fantasies of a revolution have quietly accepted the outcome of the disciplinary process.

While they remain in the movement, he is just one step closer to the political wilderness. He did not see that some were using him as a bulldog - happy to let him bark at their arch rivals and bite their enemies.

The crowds who cheered him on and believed "he speaks our language" are getting on with their lives. While he was busy speaking to them they forgot to raise their hands and ask, "but are you walking in our shoes"? Now that the noise has quietened down I hope they sober up and realise that Malema was never a champion of the poor and he leaves no sterling legacy in the endeavour to create jobs and provide quality education.

While credit is due to him for being a rabble rouser, this pseudo revolutionary has done little to appeal to our youth to commit to their education, arrive at class on time, respect their teachers and demand the best of themselves. Instead, he reminded them that they were victims and the only way to escape from poverty and unemployment was to take from others.

Apart from the scuffles outside his Seshego home, South Africa is still functioning, the sky did not fall and no "revolutionaries" are marching to Luthuli House or the Union Buildings to demand his re-instatement.

It is indeed cold outside the ANC.