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Mining Charter Three will slow South Africa’s economic flywheel devastatingly if it is not trashed

30th June 2017

By: Martin Creamer

Creamer Media Editor

     

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Mining provides virtually half of South Africa’s foreign currency from a quarter of its exports.

Without these foreign currency earnings, South Africa’s participation in global trade stands to be decimated.

Even in its hugely curtailed current state, mining remains the flywheel of the economy by providing momentum to big, small and medium-sized enterprises across the spectrum.

However, the Department of Mineral Resources (DMR), led by Mineral Resources Minister Mosebenzi Zwane, who is being openly supported by President Jacob Zuma, is squeezing the life out of the industry with its blunt Mining Charter Three instrument, ignoring the call of Deputy President Cyril Ramaphosa for the DMR and the Chamber of Mines to go back to the drawing board and start again.

Instead, the Minister is completely unrepentant about already having stripped R50-billion off the value of mining shares, and putting the pensions and provident funds of hundreds of thousands of hardworking South Africans at risk.

Also being put at risk are State-owned enterprises like Transnet, which sees to the transport and export of mined products, and Eskom, which plays an integral role across the mineral-energy complex that is this country’s biggest economic pillar.

Going unheeded are warnings from members of the economic transformation subcommittee of the ruling African National Congress (ANC), as well as concern expressed by ANC secretary general Gwede Mantashe.

Also being ignored are the pleadings of credible heads of black- controlled mining companies.

Instead, the DMR is persisting with the imposition of ultra-draconian measures, most of which lawyers say are unconstitutional, contravene the Companies Act and expose the entire South African economy to World Trade Organisation penalisation.

Being witnessed is stubborn lunacy tinged with strange sideshows, exemplified by the granting of extremely curious naturalisation to parties reportedly at the centre of all the irrationality.

The ANC has likened the strange naturalisation to the act of “feeding the neighbour’s children before you are able to feed your own”, arguing that South Africa has not yet managed to empower its own citizens yet now proposes to extend these minimal opportunities to specially naturalised citizens.

We appeal today for South Africans to work collectively to stop the rot and to ensure that a charter is put in place that serves as an instrument of positive transformation; for this to happen, the charter must be owned, defended and implemented by all stakeholders.

In the immediate term, South Africa’s political leadership must prevail upon government to suspend the application of the ill-fated Mining Charter Three and insist that the parties take part in a mediated discussion, as advocated by our Deputy President.

Edited by Martin Zhuwakinyu
Creamer Media Senior Deputy Editor

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