Johannesburg - The Pan Africanist Congress Youth League of Azania no longer planned to injure ANC Youth League president Julius Malema "to death" in a row over who organised the 1960 Sharpeville protest, its president Pitso Mphasha said on Tuesday.
This was because the PACYL blamed former president Nelson Mandela for the "distortion" over who organised the anti-pass march of 1960 and believed Malema was merely carrying this over.
"Our intelligence has revealed that Julius Malema is a pawn of Nelson Mandela," said Mphasha.
The PACYL want copies of Mandela's Long Walk to Freedom taken off bookshelves, because of his account of the massacre which left 69 people killed by police.
Deal with the disease
"It will be very useless if we deal with the symptom and not deal with the disease. We must engage with the disease," said Mphasha.
When asked what this meant, he said Mandela had begun the distortion of the events of Sharpeville so the PACYL would seek a meeting with him through the ANC and demand that copies of the book were withdrawn.
Asked if this meant that the death threat against Malema was withdrawn, he continued: "I must say that you are very correct that we are no longer going to deal with the minor thing. We are just going to deal with the main man."
He hastened to add that this did not mean a death threat to Mandela. Instead the PACYL would seek a meeting with him to discuss the book.
In a further twist, the Pan Africanist Youth Congress (Payco) issued a statement distancing itself from the league's remarks.
Payco spokesperson Sello Tladi said that although they disagreed with what Malema said about Sharpeville, Payco wanted to clarify that the league was a breakaway faction and that Payco did not see the point in murdering fellow Africans.
Payco challenged Malema to a debate on who organised Sharpeville.
However, both youth wings insisted that the other was a breakaway faction.
- SAPA
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