CONTAMINATED STREAMS

BELLINAH MABILA

Contaminated streams

#DEADLYWATER

The mines named Sinus mining, Mbali miming and Schoengesigtz mining have damage and destroyed the streams near Vosman as they discard their dumps after washing the coal in their mini plants.

This mess is happening in Vosman under Emalahleni Local Municipality in Mpumalanga Province.
During the extraction of coal, the coal is transported to the plant to be washed that’s when the mine discard the chemical used to wash the coal in the nearby stream that pollute the streams.

The people staying in Vosman during the lack of water they used to fetch water in that stream and the children would cool themselves by swimming and playing in the stream but now it’s all history.

The community started realizing that the stream is polluted when children were being attacked by scabies and has to be transported to the nearby clinic or hospital that’s costing the parents as some are not working.

Those that have livestock also are complaining about the stream. I then spoke to Mr Mahlangu who said ” I have lost more than 10 cows since the arrival of this mines ” he added “This mines do not employ our kids as they failed the medical test ”

This is a mess that can take years to be solved because if mines ca shut down we have to pray for the rain to pour a lot so that the stream can be cleaned.

We went to the Department of Minerals Resource and Energy two years ago and still waiting for them to start acting by enforcing the law to the informal mines.