Shivambu nicknames Gordhan Joshua Doore, your uncle in the ‘mob’ business

EFF deputy president Floyd Shivambu has come up with a new nickname for the EFF’s current arch-nemesis, Minister of Public Enterprises Pravin Gordhan. In a tweet accusing Gordhan of lying to both news reporters and in parliament, Shivambu expresses his view that Gordhan should go the same way as Nhlanhla Nene, who resigned after he admitted to having met with the Guptas, something he had previously denied.

“What was good for Nhlanhla Nene must be good for Joshua Doore! The mob’s uncle!” Shivambu said, birthing a new nickname that, so far, looks like it may stick.

Shivambu is referring to a mascot familiar to many South Africans.

While furniture chain Joshua Doore no longer exists, many people remember its mascot from the 80s, a balding avuncular man who does bear more than a passing resemblance to the minister.

READ MORE: Malema blames Gordhan, Treasury for VBS ‘witch-hunt’

“You’ve got an uncle in the furniture business, Joshua Doore,” was the slogan. It is likely that it’s not only his likeness to the mascot that earned Gordhan the nickname, but what the EFF alleges as his role in being an ‘uncle’ to certain interests.

Or, as journalist and author Gus Silber put it in a Facebook post:

Gordhan “is now known, at least to the battalions of EFF fighters who have dubbed him thusly in their tweets, as Joshua Doore, on account of his uncanny resemblance to the benevolent hair-winged mascot of the furniture store of that name, and also because of his assumed avuncular relationship to the forces of, you know, the neoliberal capitalist conspiracy that really runs the country.”

While the nickname has already been widely repeated and looks set to stick, not everyone is impressed with it. Prominent academic and activist Nomboniso Gasa took to Twitter to express her view that the nickname is “immature” and has a “racist slant”.

“Many people think it’s funny. I don’t,” she added.

READ MORE: Shivambu lashes out at Gordhan in paranoid blog post

Shivambu has made no secret of his belief that Gordhan is corrupt, and recently in a long, rambling and paranoid blog post accused him of, among other things, running a “cabal,” “operating a parallel state apparatus” and employing “political blackmail to slander political opponents.”

The EFF deputy president is, of course, no stranger to corruption allegations himself after the release of advocate Terry Motau’s The Great Bank Heist report, which alleged that his brother Brian had “gratuitously” received R16 million from the bank, alongside a list of 52 others.

While Floyd himself was not named, a Daily Maverick report that came out soon afterwards alleged that he had personally received roughly R10 million of the VBS money from his brother and that the EFF had received R1.3 million.

The EFF has been open about the fact that they believe their implication in the VBS Scandal was “revenge” from Gordhan and Treasury for the party’s supposed role in getting rid of former finance minister Nene. They had very vocally called for his head prior to his resignation.

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