BURGERSFORT – The National Union of Mineworkers (Num) says they were worried that mines were planning to retrench over 30 000 workers.
A majority of the mines around Burgersfort had the highest figures of men and women who will be left jobless.
“Our information showed that Bokoni Platinum in Atok, outside Burgersfort, will retrench 2 786 mineworkers, while Twickenham has already retrenched 1 103 employees,” explained Mr Makhosonke Magudulela, Num’s deputy regional chairperson in the North Eastern mines.
He added that Samancor Eastern Chrome is said to cut back over 1 765 miners and 38 of its top managers, while ASA Metals, also known as Dilokong Mine, has had to retrench 760 of its employees. Magudulela added that Phokathaba mine is planning to leave 660 of its miners without jobs. Mpumalanga province is not an exception as Nkomati Platinum Mine intends to reduce 380 of its employees.
“This number is very huge, Num will not fold arms and watch as the number of unemployed increased in the country. We hence call on mines to prevent further job lose,” adds Magudulela.
“As Num we are very much concerned about the continuous closing down of mines at the expense of mineworkers, who are earning nothing but peanuts. What pains the most is that the people whose jobs are threatened are the poor masses, while CEO’s and executive directors don’t lose their job,” he said.
Magudulela also alleged that most mining companies in the country were not adhering to the plan to prevent job loses as stipulated in Section 52 of the Department of Mineral Resources (DMR).
On the other hand Mpumalanga News learned with the closing down of mines around Burgersfort, there had been a mushrooming of job scams with criminals posing as potential mine employers.
“We have received numerous phone calls from people enquiring about job interviews at Xstrata after allegedly receiving sms’s from unknown people who invite them for interviews and even ask them to deposit a certain amount of money at Shoprite money market,” said a reliable source whose identity cannot be revealed, as he is not a spokesperson from the mines.
