The people, and not the ANC, liberated South Africa from apartheid rule, the EFF has said.

EFF spokesman Mbuyiseni Ndlozi yesterday rubbished the ruling party’s triumphant version of its role in the anti-apartheid struggle and that of its armed wing, Mkhonto weSizwe.

Ndlozi dismissed Mkhonto weSizwe as useless and lacking the courage to do battle with the then SA Defence Force – unlike its counterparts, the Zimbabwe African National Liberation Army, the military wing of Robert Mugabe’s Zimbabwe African National Union, as well as the Zimbabwe People’s Revolutionary Army of Joshua Nkomo’s Zimbabwe African People’s Union, which overcame Ian Smith’s Rhodesian forces.

ANC secretary-general Gwede Mantashe said yesterday that Western powers were intent on destabilising liberation movements in southern Africa with the intention of effecting a regime change because they had become powerful governments which they deemed inconvenient to Western interests.

Mantashe – who recently visited Zimbabwe – said similar efforts at regime change were under way in South Africa but were being carried out under the guise of strengthening democratic institutions. He did not provide proof.

Ndlozi said yesterday the South African struggle had been won not because of the strength of the liberation movement’s armed forces, but through protest by unarmed youth and workers .

“It means the people, and not the ANC, liberated South Africa. The people never waited for liberation armies to come and save them from the murderous apartheid regime. Above all, the liberation armies never came, never conducted any war inside the country, except in missions that relied on the very protest ability of our people, Ndlozi said.”