Former South African finance minister Pravin Gordhan on Monday filed a police case against opposition leader Julius Malema for allegedly inciting violence following comments he made last week.
Malema, the president of the Economic Freedom Fighters (EFF) Party, last week protested outside an ongoing corruption inquiry where Gordhan was giving evidence, allegedly accusing the minister of being “corrupt” and “a dog”.
“When we are trying to build one nation, we can’t have people using the kind of language they’ve been using and the kind of attacks they’ve been using,” Gordhan told journalists after filing the case in the capital Pretoria.
The former minister accused Malema of defamation and inciting public violence, and said it was now up to the police officers to investigate.
“This combination of the attack on one’s dignity, the attack on society more generally, propagating hate in society has to be stopped,” added Gordhan.
Gordhan was finance minister before he was abruptly fired by former president Jacob Zuma in March 2017 and is now the minister of state-owned companies.
“There were remarks made outside the (inquiry) which said there could be casualties and if you go on attacking people the way you are… the next logical point is are we facing some kind of physical harm — or even elimination,” Gordhan said on Monday.
