The Social Audit Baseline Report centres around the responses of just under 800 respondents from different households in mining towns. Natural Resources Manager at Action Aid, Christopher Rutledge, tells OFM News that 79% of the respondents claim mining has not provided them with any direct benefit, while the other 8% states that mining has only left them with sickness and ill-health. He says these figures are disturbing, to say the least, but aren’t the most damning in the report. The manager explains that of the R 7,8 billion allocated to development in mining-affected communities, only less than 20% actually goes to the community. Which begs the question, where is the money going to?

Rutledge says their research on the matter looks at listed companies on the Johannesburg Stock Exchange (JSE). This research further reveals that “30% of the value created through mining goes to shareholders directly, 24% goes to government, over 40% goes to workers and of this 0,9% goes to mining communities.” He says that this is literally nothing. What makes this worse is that more than 80% of this value does not even reach the communities. This is emblematic of a deeper structural problem in the sector,” he cautions.

The Social Audit Baseline Report will be released this evening in Cape Town, while the second day of the Mining Indaba continues. Action Aid SA criticises government’s efforts to draw international investment while there is no accountability mechanism in the mining industry as a whole, that is meant to oversee where funds go.

OFM News/Sazly Hartzenberg and Olebogeng Motse