Zuma addresses 2021 incarceration

Former President Jacob Zuma on Sunday addressed his arrest and incarceration which coincided with deadly riots in the KwaZulu-Natal and Gauteng provinces. He was welcomed by about 3 000 supporters of the Umkhonto we Sizwe Party (MKP) in Alexandra, despite arriving more than three hours late. Zuma said he was persecuted by both the apartheid and democratic governments. City Press reports that he said he had spent 10 years in an apartheid state prison for fighting for freedom and after 1994, he was persecuted again. ‘I was taken from my father’s house to jail, without even appearing before a judge. I was sentenced to 15 months, having done nothing wrong. I can’t say that that’s freedom. I was arrested by the apartheid government and this democratic government,’ he said. Zuma said the ANC had been taken over by leaders who ignored the plight of the people and turned their backs on them. ‘They took the ANC and made it their own, not the ANC of the people of SA. They stopped listening to the people. We realised that this was no longer the ANC that was formed by our forefathers. This is why we say that this ANC is that of a guy called Cyril Ramaphosa, not ours. Our ANC has never had white people controlling it . This is why we realised that the time has come to build a new political party, which stands for the liberation of black people,’ he said.