Mashaba to lead ‘groundbreaking lawsuit’ against ANC, Cabinet over riots

ActionSA on Thursday announced its intention to file a class-action lawsuit against President Cyril Ramaphosa, Minister of Police Bheki Cele and the ANC, among others.

Party leader Herman Mashaba said in a statement that more than 420 businesses had “joined hands” with ActionSA in their “groundbreaking lawsuit”.

“This exponential increase in the number of businesses signing up suggests that South Africans are gatvol with inaction, and politicians that do not serve them and do not serve South Africa,” Mashaba said.

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ActionSA’s lawsuit

Businesses join forces with Mashaba

Mashaba said these businesses “want to be part of processes that advance their interests”, and not the interests of political parties or their benefactors. 

Mashaba vowed to hold Ramaphosa accountable and called on more businesses negatively affected by recent riots and looting in KwaZulu-Natal and Gauteng to step forward.

He shared the experience of Chichi, who owns a liquor store, and said the hard work he put into his business in 13 years was dismantled in 20 minutes when police and ADT failed to assist during the protests.

Another liquor store owner, Lwazi, said he lost stock to the value of R490,000, while the owner of an import-export company said their warehouses “were ransacked by unlawful looters”.

“We lost stock, all our electronic equipment and suffered damage to our buildings”, the business owner said.

ANC’s handling of protests ‘unacceptable’

Mashaba said these responses from business owners were less than 0.1% of the submissions ActionSA received.

“The sheer scale of the devastation and loss is unlike anything we could have ever imagined,” he said.

He said the ANC’s handling of the chaos was unacceptable, especially since most households are still “gripped by the devastation of the Covid-pandemic, whose family members have also lost their lives as a result of these treasonous actions of the looters”.

“The knock-on effect will only add to the misery faced by South Africans from all walks of life on a daily basis,” Mashaba said.

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