[DEBATE] : Another Business Day article on Maandagshoek/Mining in SA

[Anne Mayher]

Greetings everyone -

Another article on Maandgashoek, mining, and related - from Business Day...

Best,
Anne
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http://www.businessday.co.za/articles/topstories.aspx?ID=BD4A945142

Posted to the web on: 23 February 2009
Land rights at heart of violence in Maandagshoek
Neels Blom

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Agriculture and Land Affairs Editor

THE platinum-rich Limpopo community of Maandagshoek is at war with
itself, mining companies and the police over land use and the spoils
of mining in the district.

Land rights attorneys and community activists say the conflict at
Maandagshoek, near Burgersfort , is a consequence of the loss of
individual land rights under customary law in SA’s tribal areas where
the state has assumed ultimate trusteeship of the land.

The Maandagshoek community members are opposing the granting of
new-order mining rights to three mines on the grounds that the
community and the mines have been unable to reach agreement on its
participation in the mining ventures and benefits to the community as
required under mining law.

In the latest round of violent clashes, police have arrested about 40
people and charged them with arson and malicious damage to property
after the house of a local chief was burnt down in what community
members said was a message to the chief to leave. Community members
admitted to Business Day last week that they had collectively set the
fire.

More than 400 people have been arrested over the past three years amid
increasingly violent clashes between community members and the mines’
security personnel and police.

The black economic empowerment ownership of the mines — Australia
Platinum, Nkwe Platinum and Modikwa — features well-connected members
of the African National Congress, former minerals minister Penuell
Maduna, Education Minister Naledi Pandor’s husband Sharif and mining
magnate Patrice Motsepe.

An estimated 30-40 community activists were arrested in Maandagshoek
last week, including their traditional leader, Isaac Kgoete. Earlier
this month, seven people were injured after being shot at with rubber
bullets .

Maandagshoek residents say the mines have been encroaching on their
land without adequate compensation and in the absence of any
agreements as required under new-order mining rights.

They also say that the mines are using private security firms which
employ ex-combatants from other African countries to harass the
community and that agents of the mines are exploiting rivalries among
the four chiefs in the area to keep the community divided.

Nkwe has a prospecting operation on the fringes of the community land
and Modikwa, an Anglo Platinum joint venture with African Rainbow
Minerals, has been operational in Maandagshoek since November 2001.
Platinum Australia’s Phokathaba division is in the early phases of
extracting concentrate from its Smokey Hills mine.

Maandagshoek community members are opposing all the operations, but
resentment is concentrated on the Smokey Hills operation, in which
Maduna has a 5% stake.

They demand infrastructure development, employment opportunities,
compensation for the loss of their grazing lands and for damage to
their houses caused by blasting.

They say the mining operations have disrupted community life. “The
community is ruined because of the mining,” Kgoete said last week.

Platinum Australia MD John Lewins denied allegations of the mine’s
involvement in the clashes, saying the mine’s security response was a
response to the arson attack on chief Ralph Kgoete . He said not
everyone in the community was opposed to the mining.

He also said the mine was employing and training local people, but it
was yet to report any revenue. In full production, about 450 local
people would work at the mine.

The estimate was about the same for the other three mines, according
to community activist Emmanuel Makgoga .

About 10000 people live in the community, where unemployment is nearly
100% among economically active people .

Lewins acknowledged that agreements with the community had not been
signed, but said the problem lay with the internal conflict in the
community.

Legal Resources Centre attorney and former land claims commissioner,
Durkje Gilfillan, said the problem at this community was not confined
to the area, but was a national issue concerning land rights.

The mines were “probably acting perfectly legally in terms of common
law”, Gilfillan said, but so much of the apartheid structures had
become common law that racial discrimination was perpetuated.

“It is unfair discrimination against the community, simply because
they are black.”





-- 
Anne Mayher
Email: akmayher at gmail.com
Mobile: 082 398 6882