National
Ramatlhodi concerned at retrenchements at SA mines─── 08:14 Fri, 05 Jun 2015
Cape Town - Mineral Resources Minister Ngoako Ramatlhodi is currently engaging and making concerted efforts to save jobs in the mining sector, his office said on Friday.
“At the last meeting of the Mining Industry Growth Development and Employment Task Team, we resolved to establish a task team focusing on initiatives to save jobs. This being a collective decision, I call on all stakeholders to lend maximum support to all efforts,” the director general of the department of mineral and resource Thibedi Ramontja said.
“As part of the management of job losses, mining companies must commit in their Social and Labour Plans [SLP] to establish effective and Formalised Future Fora. These Future Fora exist to address, inter alia, productivity, employment, promotion of efficiency and competitiveness of the company.”
The department said Ramatlhodi was deeply concerned about the impending job losses in the mining sector.
“Minister Ramatlhodi reminds mine right-holders of the importance to comply with all legal prescripts pertaining to the management of downscaling that may lead to job losses more specifically Section 52 of the Mineral and Petroleum Resources Development Act, 2002 which requires that mining companies contemplating to retrench workers should notify the department of mineral resources [DMR],” said spokesman Mahlodi Sam Muofhe.
“In this regard, a special task team has been constituted to assess the situation and provide advice to the Mining Industry Growth and Development Task Team [MIGDETT]. The task team meets on weekly basis and will be advising MIGDETT principals in due course.”
The key mandate of the team was to explore ways and means of saving jobs through engagements with relevant mining stakeholders. In addition, the Coal and Platinum Working Committee was also looking at the specific issues including long term sustainability of the two sectors.
The National Union of Mineworkers (NUM) on Thursday, said about 10,000 jobs have been shed in the mining industry since the beginning of the year.
“The NUM is concerned by the current coordinated mass retrenchment drive by major companies in the mining industry, this with underlying deliberate circumvention of current regulatory framework as stipulated by Section 52 of the MPRDA 2002 [Mineral and Petroleum Resources Development Act],” deputy secretary Tshimane Montoedi said at the time.
The union said more than 35,000 jobs were shed in the mining industry between 2012 and 2014, the majority of these were in the platinum and gold industry.
“Since the start of 2015, the whole industry has retrenched between 5000 to 10,000 jobs. As we speak there are approximately 30 companies that have issued us with Section 189 notifications, with a minimum of between 15,000 to 20,000 jobs to be lost as per companies calculation.”
Montoedi said Glencore’s Optimum Coal mine planned to implement retrenchment of more than 1000 employees on June 7, despite the fact that there was an abundance of ore reserves.
In the platinum sector, Anglo American Platinum retrenched 474 workers at its mines in Rustenburg in April.
Lonmin also announced that it was planning to shed 3500 jobs, the company was consulting workers and trade unions on its plan to cut jobs.
ANA
