S. African ruling party's youth body denounces calls for Zuma's removal

The African National Congress Youth League (ANCYL) on Tuesday denounced calls for the removal of President Jacob Zuma, saying this is tantamount to inciting violence.

The ANCYL has noted the ease with which any person in South Africa today, including leaders of various political organizations and civil society organizations, call for and threaten to remove Zuma who was democratically elected, the ANCYL said in a statement emailed to Xinhua.

"They make these threats by calling for mass demonstrations and making irresponsible statements in public. In our view, this is tantamount to inciting violence and destabilizing the Republic of South Africa," said the statement.

The ANCYL issued the statement amid growing calls for Zuma to step down.

Opposition parties say Zuma should be held accountable for the slowdown in economic growth, rampant corruption and the alleged "state capture" by the wealthy Indian Gupta family, which reportedly exerted undue influence on Zuma in the appointment of cabinet ministers.

"We are of the view that there are democratic ways of removing a seating President of the Republic of South Africa, including, amongst others, calling for a motion of no confidence and/or impeaching the President in Parliament," the ANCYL said.

The opposition parties have tried several times to impeach Zuma but their attempts have failed.

"As a last ditch, we now see a trend by some in the country to attempt to, indirectly so, remove the President of the Republic of South Africa through the Courts or by inciting violence and instability in the country through mass demonstrations and irresponsible statements in the media," the ANCYL said.

The conduct of most in the country in calling for the removal of the Zuma in this manner is tantamount to "an attempted pseudo coup", it said. Enditem