PAC youth offer Malema history lessons

The PAC youth wing called ANC officials "spoilt brats" and offered its youth leader Julius Malema "free history classes" in a scathing attack today.

In a statement, Pan Africanist Youth Congress (Payco) president Kwame Ndebele rejected the claim by ANC Youth League president Julius Malema that the PAC "hijacked" the Sharpeville protest march in 1960.

"We are willing to offer free history classes to Malema and his seniors in the ANC to save them from the never-ending embarrassment they continue to cause themselves on a yearly basis on this historic day," Ndebele said.

"Malema's foolish outburst reflects a determination to accept lies and delusion as fact, which is nothing but a sign of stupidity and ignorance of a highest order."

Ndebele said it was common "fact and history" that the Sharpeville protest on March 21 1960, during which police shot dead 69 people protesting against pass laws, was organised by the PAC under the leadership of Robert Mangaliso Sobukwe.

He attacked the ANC for not contributing towards the liberation struggle during apartheid.

"The ANC has never led any campaign that radically changed the history of our country or our liberation struggle, it has always been reactive and hostile to other revolutionary parties for taking an initiative hence they behave like spoilt brats and claim everything that has nothing to do with them," he said.

"The ANC approach has always been that of carrying suitcases and dining with whites, in an effort to negotiate a deal to be incorporated in the white only club governing our motherland."

Payco was reacting to ANCYL spokesman Floyd Shivambu's reiteration of Malema's comments on Wednesday.

"Tata Nelson Mandela clearly narrates in the 'Long Walk to Freedom' how the PAC hijacked the anti-pass laws campaign and contributed to the massacre of our people," he said.

Payco said it would "relentlessly reject any attempts by the ANC and Malema in particular to hijack PAC's glorious achievements by telling lies to the youth of our country".

"We are aware that Malema struggled with his matric, but we were not aware that even basic history lessons were equivalent to rocket science to him," he said.