A parliamentary hearing in South Africa devolved into fisticuffs between members of the radical opposition Economic Freedom Fighters (EFF) political party and representatives of Agang South Africa party.
According to The EastAfrican newspaper, the scuffle broke out after John Steenhuisen, Chief Whip of the Democratic Alliance, called EFF members "VBS looters", apparently referring to the alleged theft of money from VBS bank.
In response, EFF MPs quickly blasted him as a "white racist" and things quickly went downhill from there, with EFF member Nazier Paulsen and Agang MP Andries Tlouamma coming to blows as other MPs tried to break up the fight.
The mutual bank allegedly served as "a slush fund for corrupt politicians, local government leaders and their business cronies, by way of a breathtakingly elaborate and cynical pyramid scheme," with the bank owners being accused of bribing local officials to have them divert their budgets into VBS coffers, the BBC reports.
And while EFF Deputy President Floyd Shivambu wasn’t directly implicated in the report, his brother who worked within the EFF is named as "the alleged recipient of about $1.1 million for one year's consultancy work."
