Why so quiet, Julius?

If there’s a big news event in South Africa, one thing you can always be sure of is that opposition parties will have something to say about it.

They fall over themselves to release statements expressing their shock, disappointment and condemnation of whatever it is that whoever it is shouldn’t have done. The DA and the Economic Freedom Fighters are normally the loudest, fastest and most opinionated of them all.

But it’s been more than a week now since news broke that Grace Mugabe was due to be arrested for allegedly handing a beating to a number of young women, Gabriella Engels among them. And since that alleged event on August 13, there’s been a lot of water under the Beitbridge, with still no word from the EFF.

We thought Grace was in custody, then we thought she was still to hand herself over; then we thought she’d fled home after absconding from her scheduled court appearance; and then there was the news she was still in South Africa.

After much hoo-hah, it all came to a rather predictable, damp-squibby end with Grace leaving on the nearest jet plane back to Harare, clutching her dodgily signed letter of immunity from Mama Maite in one hand and holding the mummified arm of her dearly appointed saviour, the Ancient One himself, with the other.

And through it all, where was the EFF? Where was the party with the loudest leaders on the Twitter streets, in parliament and everywhere?

What was their view of all of this? We really have no idea, since there was little more than a blanket silence from the party and every single one of its most prominent leaders – not so much as even a half-hearted statement expressing a lukewarm concern.

I’m not sure if this silence should be read as condonation of Grace’s alleged attack on a South African citizen, and the misbegotten immunity the first lady later received.

But it’s hard to see it any other way.

What does this teach us about the EFF?

I’m not entirely sure, but very little of it is flattering.

It teaches us this is a party that will trumpet itself as the high-minded moral alternative only when they happen not to like the person they think is not being moral.

It teaches us that their condemnation of Jacob Zuma and his government has nothing to do with him actually doing anything wrong – just that it’s not okay to do something wrong while at the same time being someone the EFF doesn’t approve of.

The EFF has always preached its adoration of President Robert Mugabe for no reason other than the fact that he oversaw the wholesale land expropriation of white-owned farms in Zimbabwe.

The EFF appears not to care one little bit that Zimbabwe’s programme of “land reform” has not left the general population of Zimbabwe any better off than it was before (in fact, they are objectively worse off); the EFF does not care that a general abandonment of modern commercial farming has wreaked havoc on the agricultural environment, never mind the economy; and they do not care that much of the expropriated land ended up in the hands of the Zanu-PF elite. They also apparently couldn’t care that Zanu-PF stole an entire election.

All they care about is that a relatively small group of a few thousand white farmers were taught a lesson and were left much worse off than they used to be. It doesn’t matter if almost everyone else was also left worse off. What matters was that Robert “Samson” Mugabe brought the whole horrible colonial edifice crumbling down around him in his desperate bid to cling to power at all costs. And for that he is still the EFF’s great pan-African hero.

So because of that, it appears it doesn’t matter what Bob Mugabe, his wife or his children do, and which further crimes they may commit from today and onwards into eternity. Because, perhaps, they have been washed clean in the blood of the white farmers’ lambs and are now pure and sinless, incapable of any further wrongs.

Because that is how it appears, eh.

Much was made of the fact that Malema urged Mugabe to retire earlier this year, and the EFF were given a stern rebuke from Zanu-PF for offering this rather unwelcome advice.

Some remember this incident as evidence of the fact that the EFF and Zanu-PF were “fighting” and no longer friends.

But EFF spokesperson Mbuyiseni Ndlozi was quick to make it clear they still “loved” their hero, they just wanted him to “go rest” and make way for younger leaders in Zimbabwe.

I’m almost happy this ridiculous episode has taken place. It serves as another perfect example of why it would be profoundly foolish to keep telling ourselves the EFF is really this principled alternative many would like to think it is.

They’re politicians. And they do what politicians do. And that is very rarely very pleasant.

Charles Cilliers, Citizen.co.za digital editor