![]() It says such deals “must be beneficial to the community represented by such council”, but does not require consultation. The bill before parliament formalises the current political system in the homelands with a clause allowing traditional councils to enter partnerships with any “body or institution”. I never got benefit, nothing,” said 57-year-old Leg Phalanea as he walked down a dusty street near the mine. “The way they apply the proceeds is perceived not to benefit the broader community,” he said.Īround Mogalakwena, set amid rust-tinged rocky outcrops in sweltering latitudes north of Johannesburg, resentment over grinding poverty runs deep. ![]() Implats CEO Nico Muller told Reuters the company would not change the structure itself but wanted the two sides to resolve their differences. Impala Platinum’s Marula mine says it lost 10,000 ounces of almost 80,000 ounces of production in the last financial year to community protests that included road blocks, vehicle stonings and assaults on people reporting for work.Ī nearby chrome project it set up with a tribal council - made up of a chief and his aides - has collapsed and Impala says it may soon have to close Marula, which would be the first such shutdown in South Africa linked purely to social upheaval.įalling platinum prices have multiplied the pressure. At that project, there have been no protests so far.ĭiscontent has not been confined to Mogalakwena, the world’s largest open-pit platinum mine, where Amplats says protests two years ago cost it 8,600 ounces of its annual 200,000-plus ounces of production. “What we are trying to do is get away from some of the previous structures where we felt obliged to pay the money over to the Kgoshi (chief),” Griffiths told Reuters, noting a new-style deal on a chrome project in February. “They tend to attract attention and create an impression that this represents the African way of leadership,” he said.Ĭhris Griffith, chief executive of Amplats, a unit of Anglo American, said the company was fully behind the restructuring of the community trust and was applying the lessons learned to other deals. Zolani Mkiva, head of presidency at Contralesa, the umbrella group for South Africa’s traditional leaders, agreed that the African way is bottom up, but said what he called isolated cases involving some mining deals were giving the chiefs a bad name. ![]() We don’t regard the current very authoritarian top-down style of chieftanship as consistent with the traditional institution.” “Our view is that this more democratic model is far more aligned with traditional law and custom. It is a plan that, if copied elsewhere, would dilute the power of the tribal leaders and could do the same to the ANC, which has ruled South Africa since the end of apartheid in 1994.īut Spoor says he and his legal team, who are acting for the communities rather than the mine, are not undermining tradition. ![]() “We are renegotiating the agreement to make it more accountable,” said the lawyer, Richard Spoor, whose work has included spearheading a class action suit against gold producers over the fatal lung disease silicosis which miners contract. To avoid such an outcome, a leading human rights lawyer is negotiating with the local royal house to allow community representatives more control over the fund. “If they don’t give us that 175 million rand ($13 million), we are going to shut down the mine,” said Chippa Langa, a leader of the community around the Mogalakwena platinum mine, referring to a community fund set up by Anglo American Platinum (Amplats). Many locals say they are seeing none of the proceeds. The traditional leaders have acted as intermediaries with companies which have discovered chrome and coal as well as platinum in the homelands and hope to find shale gas. Tribal leaders are also key allies of President Jacob Zuma, whose political base has become increasingly rural, and his African National Congress party has drafted a law that would cement their control.īut with protests spreading across the homelands, the communities, mining companies and some within the ANC itself are moving to change what they see as an anachronistic system. ![]() At the heart of the conflict are tribal leaders who have royal titles and feudal-style control over the homelands, poor rural areas designated to South Africa’s black majority by its former white minority rulers during apartheid. ![]()
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