In a move that has sent shockwaves across South African politics, the EFF and ActionSA have announced that they are merging.
According to Payola Oldsfir, a spokesperson for the two parties, the move had been coming for quite some time and was finalised this week.
According to Oldsfir, the new political movement will be called the Economic Action Figures – ensuring that there is some continuity between the names of the two organisations but inserting a new word to indicate that the past is being left behind.
Insiders said that the two parties had already drawn up a plan on how to govern following the 2024 election and would be splitting the provinces between themselves.
ActionSA would govern most of the coastal provinces while the EFF would get the prize of those inland. The economic hub would be co-governed by the two parties, the insider said. The co-governance arrangement in Gauteng was necessary as neither party wanted to govern Fourways or Boksburg and this was the most satisfactory compromise, with both parties being in charge of those areas.
There had also apparently been some disagreement over the party’s new uniforms with the EFF keen to continue with their berets and overalls, to represent socialism and the working class.
However, ActionSA members demanded something to represent their commitment to capitalism and the free market. The new merger agreement will apparently see the Economic Action Figures keeping the berets as well as the overalls, although these will now be in ActionSA’s green. At the same time, an addition to the ensemble will be ties for men and tiaras for women to indicate that the new movement is not only socialist (represented by the overalls) but also capitalist.
When asked about this contradiction, Oldsfir said that the seemingly deep ideological differences between the two parties had not stopped them from attempting to work together in the past, and this would not be a problem now that the two parties had formally merged.