Chaneng community’s big issues. (extract from Rustenburg Review 2011)

Royal Bafokeng Platinum ducking to offer Chaneng shares

Considering the uneven distribution of wealth by the Royal Bafokeng Administration and that land invaded (as explained above) is valuable to sustain the livelihoods of the current and future generations of Chaneng community, Kgotla of Chaneng has put on the table a proposal to be offered a 15- 30% shares in the BRPM JV. Chaneng and its three neighbouring communities (Robega, Mafenya and Rasimone), have protested against the unethical business conduct of the mine when it
keeps referring the matters discussed in their meetings to the Royal Bafokeng Administration.

Unemployment

Chaneng
Mine subcontractors bring their previously preferred labour, especially from Welkom and foreign countries. On 12 July the RBPlat announced that in the process only 58 locals (32 Chaneng) out of the total labour force are currently employed despite the January 26 meeting promise, that by mid March 2011 at least 150 locals will be employed.
The total staff complement of Styldrift Project is 509 including locals and broad SA: 155, Rustenburg 154 plus foreigners 142.
The total number of employees of BRPM JV project is unknown but it is not less than 4000, according to information received from NUM shop steward.
The imbalance of number of locals employed, in the current Styldrift Project; indicate that there is more inequities occurring in the Project

Mafenya
Only four (4) have been employed from Mafenya out of 58 local employees.
The youth are the highly unemployed and part of a large population (1200) of Mafenya.
Mines claim that locals lack skills, qualification and experience and are therefore not employable. It has been proven that the subcontractors employ Lesotho residents mostly because they accept low wages and to work under low work ethics and racists employers, as they constantly employ workers who are unskilled and illiterate whom they could easily get from the affected communities..

Prior to operations, mining companies do not avail relevant training for the members of the community to benefit from job opportunities in mining.
Environmental Destruction

Air quality
The carbon emissions in Rustenburg, equally as in SA, are high. The emission levels in the city concentrated by mining and smelter activities are unknown to the Chaneng and Mafenya team.
However, the BRPM JV management mention that they are using dust buckets to measure the air quality levels. The mine claims to be emitting below the set standard and levels. Since the mining operations started, lung diseases such as asthma, TB and sinusitis complications are increasing.

Polluted water
In 2009 SRK Consulting reported in a local community meeting that the underground water is polluted and a message must be send out to all affected communities to alert them not to consume water from boreholes. The reason of the alert came after SRK had tested the water and results proved high levels of nitrate in underground water.
Following the unconfirmed reasons for a cause of high nitrate levels, Kgotla of Chaneng on 22 September 2010 requested the national Department of Water Affairs and Forestry (DWAF) to conduct a test on the water and further provide reason for the cause of high nitrates in our underground water. To date, the department has not even bordered to come and present the test results for unknown reasons, despite the community’s follow-up.

Health Care

A visit to the clinic on weekdays requires no scientist to prove that the facilities and staff members are not enough to deal with the influx of the local community and its backroom dwellers.
Currently there are no doctors in the clinic, no ambulance coupled with poor management or patient treatment. At the time of writing this report the district Department of Health had not issued the official statistics of the Chaneng Clinic user health status. Chaneng Clinic is used by all four communities mentioned in this report