Vuyani Pambo | |
---|---|
Member of the National Assembly | |
Assumed office 22 May 2019 | |
National Spokesperson of the Economic Freedom Fighters | |
In office February 2020 –February 2022 Servingwith Delisile Ngwenya | |
President | Julius Malema |
Preceded by | Mbuyiseni Ndlozi |
Succeeded by | Leigh-Ann Mathys Sinawo Tambo |
Personal details | |
Born | Diepkloof,Soweto Transvaal,South Africa | 12 August 1989
Political party | Economic Freedom Fighters |
Education | St David's Marist,Inanda |
Alma mater | University of the Witwatersrand |
Vuyani Pambo (born 12 August 1989) is a South African politician and former student activist. He has represented the Economic Freedom Fighters (EFF) in the National Assembly since May 2019 and serves as the head of the EFF presidency. He rose to political prominence as a leader of the Fees Must Fall movement at the University of the Witwatersrand,where he was the head of the EFF Student Command. A member of the EFF Central Command since December 2019,he also served as the party's national spokesperson between February 2020 and February 2022.
Pambo was born in 1989 in Diepkloof,Soweto,where he was raised by a single mother. [1] [2] He attended St David's Marist on a scholarship. [3] At the University of the Witwatersrand,he completed a Bachelor's degree in African literature and international relations before embarking on a Bachelor of Laws. [1]
Pambo became politically active through the Black Consciousness Movement and,as a law student at Wits,was attracted to the Economic Freedom Fighters (EFF) because of its support for land redistribution. [1] He became the inaugural chairperson of the Wits branch of the EFF Students Command (EFFSC) when it was launched in 2013. [4] The following year,he and 11 other EFF members occupied the office of Adam Habib,the Wits vice-chancellor,as part of a protest demanding the EFFSC's registration as an official student society. [5] [6]
In his capacity as Wits EFFSC chairperson,Pambo was involved in the launch of the Fees Must Fall protest at Wits in October 2015. [7] [8] He remained a pivotal figure in the movement,including when it was rekindled in 2016. [9] [10] The Mail &Guardian described Pambo and Mcebo Dlamini as "populist leaders",dependent on "well-worn revolutionary sloganeering and confrontational antics", [11] and political commentator Justice Malala later criticised Pambo for propagating "the politics of spectacle and destruction" in the students' movement. [12] Pambo's role in the protests is captured in two documentary films:Aryan Kaganof's Decolonising Wits and Rehad Desai's Everything Must Fall. [13] [14]
In March 2019,the EFF announced that it had nominated Pambo as candidate for election to the Parliament of South Africa. [15] He was ranked 31st on the EFF's national party list –one place behind fellow Fees Must Fall activist Naledi Chirwa. [16] Pambo,then serving as the party's elections coordinator,won a seat in the National Assembly in the May 2019 election. [17] In addition,in December 2019,he was elected to a five-year term on the party's 40-member Central Command Team. [18]
After the party's next plenum in Centurion in February 2020,Pambo was appointed as the national spokesperson of the EFF,replacing longstanding incumbent Mbuyiseni Ndlozi. [19] [20] He served in that position alongside Delisile Ngwenya. [21] In February 2022,he and Ngwenya were replaced by Leigh-Ann Mathys and Sinawo Tambo;Pambo became head of the office of the EFF presidency under EFF leader Julius Malema. [22]
In November 2021,Malema said that Pambo would face internal disciplinary action after he missed the deadline to declare his financial interests to Parliament. [23]
Paulsen had been ranked 15th on the EFF's national list and 7th on the EFF's Gauteng regional-to-national list for the 2024 general election. [24] [25] He was re-elected to parliament on the EFF national list. [26]
According to Pambo,he is fluent in most of South Africa's 11 official languages. [3] He was hijacked in Diepkloof in June 2022. [27]
Julius Sello Malema is a South African politician. He is the founder and leader of the Economic Freedom Fighters (EFF),a populist far-left political party known for the red berets and military-style outfits worn by its members. Before the foundation of EFF,he served as president of the African National Congress Youth League (ANCYL) from 2008 until his expulsion from the party in 2012.
The Economic Freedom Fighters (EFF) is a South African communist and black nationalist political party. It was founded by expelled former African National Congress Youth League (ANCYL) president Julius Malema,and his allies,on 26 July 2013. Malema is president of the EFF,heading the Central Command Team,which serves as the central structure of the party. It is currently the fourth-largest party in the National Assembly.
Nyiko Floyd Shivambu is a South African politician who served as a member of parliament for the Economic Freedom Fighters until 15 August 2024,when he joined Jacob Zuma's uMkhonto weSizwe.
Rhodes Must Fall was a protest movement that began on 9 March 2015,originally directed against a statue at the University of Cape Town (UCT) that commemorates Cecil Rhodes. The campaign for the statue's removal received global attention and led to a wider movement to "decolonise" education across South Africa. On 9 April 2015,following a UCT Council vote the previous night,the statue was removed.
#FeesMustFall was a student-led protest movement that began in mid-October 2015 in South Africa. The goals of the movement were to stop increases in student fees as well as to increase government funding of universities. Protests started at the University of Witwatersrand and spread to the University of Cape Town and Rhodes University before rapidly spreading to other universities across the country. Although initially enjoying significant public support the protest movement started to lose public sympathy when the protests started turning violent.
Mbuyiseni Quintin Ndlozi MP is a South African politician and political activist. He has been a Member of the National Assembly,representing the Economic Freedom Fighters,since 2014. He also served as the first official spokesperson for the party until his resignation in 2020. He was replaced as party spokesperson by fellow member of the Economic Freedom Fighters,youth activist Vuyani Pambo.
Puleng Peter "Pule" Mabe is a South African politician who served as the national spokesperson of the African National Congress (ANC),South Africa's governing party,from 2018 to 2023. He formerly represented the ANC in the National Assembly from 2014 to 2017.
Daluxolo Christopher Mpofu is a South African lawyer,politician,and former businessman who was the National Chairperson of the Economic Freedom Fighters (EFF) from 2014 to 2019. He served on the Judicial Service Commission from 2017 to 2022 and formerly served as chief executive officer of the South African Broadcasting Corporation from 2005 to 2009.
"Dubul' ibhunu",translated as shoot the Boer,as kill the Boer or as kill the farmer,is a controversial anti-apartheid South African song. It is sung in Xhosa or Zulu. The song originates in the struggle against apartheid when it was first sung to protest the Afrikaner-dominated apartheid government of South Africa.
Gwen Sinethemba Amanda Ngwenya is a South African politician and public policy specialist. She was the head of policy for the Democratic Alliance (DA) between 2018 and 2023,excepting a hiatus from January to November 2019. During that time she represented the party in the National Assembly of South Africa from February 2018 to May 2019.
Mzwandile Collen Masina is a South African politician from Gauteng who has represented the African National Congress (ANC) in the National Assembly since June 2024. He is the chairperson of Parliament's Portfolio Committee on Trade,Industry and Competition. He was formerly the Mayor of Ekurhuleni from 2016 to 2021 and the Deputy Minister of Trade and Industry from 2014 to 2016.
Naledi Nokukhanya Chirwa-Mpungose is a South African politician and former student activist from Gauteng. She represents the Economic Freedom Fighters (EFF) in the National Council of Provinces. She was formerly a member of the National Assembly between May 2019 and June 2024. She rose to prominence through her involvement in the #FeesMustFall student protests at the University of Pretoria between 2015 and 2016.
Jacob Boy Mamabolo is a South African politician from Limpopo who serves as a Member of the National Assembly of South Africa. He was elected to Parliament at the 2019 general election. Mamabolo is a member of the African National Congress.
Phuti Peter Keetse is a South African politician who served as a Member of the National Assembly for the Economic Freedom Fighters (EFF) from 2019 to 2020. He was the president of the party's student organisation and a FeesMustFall activist. Keetse played a very significant role in mobilising students' activist and was also an active in the early formation of the EFF Student Command,Which he eventually became its President.
Delisile Blessing Ngwenya is a South African politician who has been one of the two national spokespeople of the Economic Freedom Fighters since 2020. She was a member of the National Assembly from 2019 to 2021. From 2016 to 2019,Ngwenya was a permanent delegate to the National Council of Provinces.
David Masondo is a South African politician who is currently serving as Deputy Minister of Finance since May 2019. He is also the second deputy general secretary of the South African Communist Party (SACP) and a member of the National Executive Committee of the African National Congress (ANC).
Nompendulo Thobile Mkhatshwa is a South African politician,former student leader and former #FeesMustFall activist who served as a Member of the National Assembly of South Africa for the African National Congress (ANC).
Ncediso Goodenough "Zizi" Kodwa is a South African politician and communications strategist who served as the Minister of Sports,Arts and Culture from March 2023 until his resignation in June 2024. Before that,he was the Deputy Minister of State Security from 2019 to 2023. He was formerly the national spokesperson of the African National Congress (ANC) from 2014 to 2018.
Michael Collen Sedibe is a South African politician who is currently a Member of the Mpumalanga Provincial Legislature and the provincial leader of the legislature's official opposition party,the Economic Freedom Fighters (EFF). He joined the EFF in 2013 after he was expelled from the African National Congress and he was first elected to the provincial legislature in the 2014 general election. In September 2022,he was elected to a third term as the EFF's Provincial Chairperson in Mpumalanga.
Keoagile Elias Matojane is a South African judge of the Supreme Court of Appeal. Formerly an attorney,he was a judge of the Gauteng High Court from December 2009 until December 2022,when he was appointed to the Supreme Court of Appeal.