South Africa has a mining industry that employs 495 000 people. It pays these employees more than R102-billion a year. It contributes R18-billion a year to government in taxes. It has been a flywheel that has assisted economic development for 140 years. It is considerably more transformed than any other local industrial sector and it has a lot more to offer. But, like the fool who killed the goose that was laying a golden egg for him each and every day, the errant Mineral Resources Ministry is grasping for so much more than the industry is able to provide and will without doubt cause the citizens of South Africa and future generations to lose out on the valuable contribution that proper enabling would ensure.