Malema was provisionally sequestrated by the High Court in Pretoria.
“We are going to Parliament. There is no Sars that can be used to stop us from going to Parliament,” he told Economic Freedom Fighters supporters in Mooiplaas, near Pretoria on Monday.
“Sars doesn’t vote for people to go to Parliament. You are the ones who send people to Parliament if you want us to go to Parliament.”
Malema and anyone else who did not want the order to be made final had until May 26 to give reasons as to why this should not happen.
His lawyer Tumi Mokwena said Malema’s ambitions to serve in Parliament would be thwarted should a provisional sequestration order against him become final.
He would be allowed to stand as an MP, but with potential complications. Should he be elected, he would lose his seat as MP if the provisional order became final.
The EFF said Malema would remain its presidential candidate in the general elections.
His impending sequestration will do little, if anything, to serve as a death knell to his political career or ambitions.
And far more than leave him dispirited, it will spur him to mobilise more people into the ranks of his party, according to political.
Analysts Independent Newspapers spoke to agreed that the sequestration order would do nothing to diminish Malema’s political ambitions.
“I do think that it will be a political inconvenience for him because he would have (by the time the full sequestration order is imposed) used Parliament as a platform to advance his political mission. In fact he might even take a spin to say the plot thickens and use every avenue to show that it’s proof further of this conspiracy,” said Dr Somadoda Fikeni.
“Even if he is not in Parliament, they (EFF members) may put a positive spin by simply saying they were planning to use him full time in building the party. I do think that irrespective of sequestration, this is unlikely to change the minds of his members to vote for Agang, which is trying to recover from its near-fatal wounds.”
Professor Shadrack Gutto said Malema could still continue mobilising his party to become a strong opposition.
“As a politician and a person who is streetwise and well-groomed by the ANC, there is no reason why he is unable to turn it around and cry foul as a victim of political conspiracy, just as Zuma was able to do. So anything could be turned into votes,” Gutto said.
Aubrey Matshiqi concurred: “There is nothing that bars him from campaigning for EFF in the next three months and beyond. In fact, to prove the fact that it might do little do dispirit him, you might see him using that as a tool to campaign to show that he is not in a state of despair.”
Matshiqi said the EFF had been preparing for any eventually and it could have thought about Malema’s role in the party beyond Parliament.
“If the issue is whether or not he should go to Parliament, the alternative is who goes there to lead the EFF contingent. Remember, EFF is by orientation a social movement to support communities. This might give him the opportunity to mobilise on the ground while somebody represents the party in Parliament, just as the DA has Lindiwe Mazibuko, who is not necessarily its leader.”
The EFF said it “fully and firmly” stood behind Malema and repeated the view that the tax evasion charges were proof that Sars was being used by the ANC.
“The Sars continues to be used by those in the ruling party who fear to meet EFF and CIC (commander in chief) in particular on the ballot, and now want to use courts to take the inevitable electoral victory of the EFF (led by Malema) out of the race.
“The EFF and CIC must be met in elections and rejected by the electorate, not by Sars or the courts,” said EFF spokesman Mbuyiseni Ndlozi.
