March and March leader Jacinta Ngobese-Zuma has criticised Economic Freedom Fighters (EFF) president Julius Malema for visiting a South African-owned spaza shop during his door-to-door campaign, pointing to his earlier remarks that South Africans should focus on major industries rather than small businesses.
The criticism followed an EFF social media post highlighting Malema’s visit to a home where he expressed happiness that the owner was South African and supported their spaza shop business.
In response, Ngobese-Zuma questioned the apparent contrast between the visit and Malema’s previous comments about the country’s economic priorities.
“All along he was saying we are fighting for crumbs, fighting for Spaza Shops instead of banks and mines but when it’s campaign time he goes to those spaza shops owned by South Africans!! Why not go to banks and mines and campaign there?” she wrote.
What Malema previously said about spaza shops
In June 2026, Malema criticised the focus on foreign nationals operating spaza shops, arguing that the debate should instead concentrate on ownership of major sectors of the economy, including mines and other strategic industries.
Speaking at the funeral service of MK Party parliamentary deputy chief whip Mzikayise Ntshingila, Malema questioned why people were mobilising against foreign-owned spaza shops but not organising similar action around the ownership of mines.
He argued that South Africans were being distracted from what he described as the bigger struggle for economic ownership and transformation.
Ngobese-Zuma’s latest criticism centres on that distinction: she argues that Malema’s decision to highlight a South African-owned spaza shop during campaigning appears inconsistent with his earlier emphasis on banks, mines and other major economic sectors.
The EFF’s post, however, presented the visit positively, highlighting Malema’s happiness at seeing a South African-owned business. The exchange does not, on its own, establish that the visit was merely an election tactic.
A wider political disagreement
The exchange reflects broader differences between Malema and Ngobese-Zuma on immigration and the township economy.
Ngobese-Zuma, who leads the March and March movement, has called for the township economy to be returned to South African ownership and has advocated stronger action against undocumented immigration. Malema, meanwhile, has argued that the debate over foreign-owned spaza shops should not overshadow questions about who controls the country’s major economic assets.
The two have also clashed publicly on social media over immigration-related issues. Their latest exchange brings the disagreement back to spaza shops, this time with Ngobese-Zuma questioning Malema’s campaign approach rather than only his economic argument.
