MACUA To Protest Seriti Resources Headquarters in Sandton
The Mining Affected Communities United in Action (MACUA), along with the communities of Phola, Ogies and surrounding farms in Nkangala District Municipality, Mpumalanga, will be protesting outside Seriti’s Head Offices to demand that the company accounts for its failures to take accountability for the mine’s impact on the community.
We have been engaging with Seriti Coal in good faith since 2022 when they took over Klipspruit, New Largo and Khutala Colliery. We have been demanding that hosting communities should participate in and benefit from the wealth extraction happening on its doorstep as well as demanding that the mine accounts for the health and social impacts caused by the mine as stipulated in the Mineral and Petroleum Resources Development Act (MPRDA) regulations 46(a) and compliance with NEMA mining license holder obligation.
MACUA has written numerous emails to both Seriti and the DMRE Regional Office pertaining Seriti’s lack of compliance to the MPRDA regulations. We have attended the disorganised, and unaccountable Community Consultative Forum—which operates without any mandate from the hosting communities.
We have observed an increase of health issues suffered by the community as a result of the blasting activities of the mine, as well as the damages experienced by residents’ houses which are cracked by the force of the blasts, leaving their homes vulnerable and unsafe for human habitation.
Seriti Coal mine has deliberately and systematically excluded MACUA from consultation processes and they have instead only invited a small group of individuals who are colluding with the mine to avoid the mine’s legal obligations to the community. The result of this collusion by the mine with a few connected individuals and political parties means that communities are still experiencing the devastating impacts of the mining activities, while the mine evades its legal obligations to undertake an approved Social Labour Plan and adequate pollution mitigation measures.
We will be exercising our hard-earned rights to protest to express our grievances and dissatisfaction with how Seriti is manipulating and dividing the hosting community to keep them in poverty and suffering the health and social impacts of mining, while a few executives and connected politicians reap the benefits that continue to deepen poverty and inequality.
Details of the march are as follows:
Time: 10H00
Location: Seriti Head Office, 15 Chaplin Rd, Illovo, Sandton
For more information, contact:
Magnificent Mndebele (media and communications manager): 064 785 9746