Malema says Africa let down Zimbabwe

SOUTH African opposition politician Julius Malema said his country blundered by failing to emulate Zimbabwe's land reform policy at the turn of the millennium.

Speaking on Sunday, Malema, who leads South Africa's third-largest political party, Economic Freedom Fighters (EFF), said Zimbabwe was isolated because other African countries failed to reclaim their land from white minority farmers.

Said Malema: "South Africa will never succeed in economic liberation without other African countries being economically liberated. We failed to follow Zimbabwe," he said.

"When they took the land, we and every other African country should have followed. Zimbabwe then wouldn't have been isolated, there would have been room to negotiate."

Back in 2000, Zimbabwe's then-President, Robert Mugabe, ordered the expropriation and redistribution of most white-owned farms.

The move was condemned by Western countries that accused Zimbabwe of violating property rights and responded by imposing punitive sanctions on the southern African country.