Women living In Mining Affected Communities.

Bongekile Zwane
Mpumalanga Carolina
18 July 2021,Sunday
We currently surrounding by more than 10 mines, which are neighbouring more than 10 farms.
Our community faces challenges on a daily base when it comes to mines; most of the women in the
area are single mothers. The only form of income that they have is the child support grant that they
receive monthly. During the lock down period, we tried to distribute Dignity packs to try and reduse Covid-19 effects in our communities. we saw a major change in our community, most women came back and thanked us for assistance.
Others stated that we should assist other communities as well. What we realized as community leaders, these women are not employed by the mines in the area, instead most men are being employed and when these women request money from them, they get abused. Our women need to be employed or given business opportunities in these mines which will bring down the rate of unemployment and abuse. Certain programmes were conducted by the organization assisting girls in schools where Dignity packs was distributed, dialogues were held, meetings were conducted by the organisation. Meetings were held with women in farming communities discussing issues around patriarchal influence, Unemployment, business opportunities.
We mainly assist them with the knowledge and skills transfer that we receive during the workshops. With enough resources Research will be done in mines requesting data on the number of women employed by mines, rising awareness on women being disturbed by Gender based Violence in the mines and workplace. Equipping them on the Peoples Mining Charter and Human Rights so that if we are fighting on behalf of them they will have an idea of what’s going on.
We would like to continue assisting such communities, with the help from stakeholders. Seeing smiles on our women brings joy and happiness knowing that we can make a difference in their lives.
These are some stories we came across while delivering Dignity packs:
The Dignity parcel consisted out of Two Toilet papers, one bottle of Jik, 3 Bathing soap, 2 Packets of pad, roll on and tooth paste. The team was instructed to fill out the questionnaire with each individual in a private space because we found that some of the questions were very personal and needed the administrator to have a one on one with the beneficiaries. Issues that we came across were that most of the women in our community are Unemployed and have to deal with abusive relationships. Giving the beneficiaries time to interact with the administrator in a private space made the beneficiary calm and we managed to get out as much information as possible.
There were also elderly women who came to receive dignity parcels since they were in need of the items given. Our community is highly affected by poverty even though there are many mines surrounding us. Since the pandemic most women cannot go out looking for work at the mines and shops because they were advised to stay at home. Most of these women go out hustling to put food on their tables at night, they go house to house requesting to be domestic workers to feed the families.
We came across a young lady who has a 5-month baby; she is a drug addict and is seeking help. While she was being asked questions by one of the administrators she started crying and stating that she is abused by her partner and mother-in-law. She had full bruises on her face and black/blue marks around her neck. When the administrator asked her, what happened she said that she was hit by her mother-in-law and partner because she requested money to buy the baby nappies. The
Department of Social Development was contact straight away for assistance. She included that
when she got to the police station to report the case, she was told that she is a drug addict and
cannot be assisted. A Meeting was scheduled with The Department of Social Services to come up
with an agreement to take her to rehab and for baby to be put in a safe house which she agreed it
should happen since her family doesn’t want to have anything to do with her since she’s been on
drugs.
During the delivery we noticed that most of the beneficiaries were young girls, who are stuck in
poverty households. These girls are at an age where they can see that the living conditions are not
to their favour, this is where they start dating elderly men who work at the mines which start
abusing these girls Physically and Emotionally. An instance that we came across were these four
young ladies living in a shack benefiting from the child support grant and due to the pandemic, they
cannot go look for work. The Pandemic is causing major disturbance in our community because
there is a high number of young girls not going to school and they becoming victims of rape, some of
which they become sex workers at a young age.We disturbed food to 35 people in Carolina- Gasella Area, this
community was identified during our last Dignity Pack Distribution. The challenge that we