South Africa

Recapping the Project

7/2/2017

Eita,
And with that, the investigation is finished. I have been covering mine closure and abandonment in South Africa for much of the past two years, and it's now time to find the next thread to pull. Before that, a few closing thoughts...

I must of course give massive thanks to the Fund for Investigative Journalism, the Pulitzer Center on Crisis Reporting and the Fund for Environmental Journalism who all gave generously to make my reporting possible. My work would not have found success if not for the constant support and guidance (not to mention the office and endless supply of coffee) from the amazing staff at the Centre for Sustainability in Mining and Industry. Additionally, thank you to everyone at Independent Media who gave me a second home at 47 Sauer. And to all my sources who trusted me, invited me into your homes, shared your stories, I am beyond grateful.

Final thoughts below, but first, here is the batch of stories I produced in the last third of the project:

Climate Home
http://www.climatechangenews.com/2017/03/22/unfinished-business-coal-miners-south-africa-walk-away-clean/
Unfinished business: Coal miners across South Africa walk away from clean up

Roads & Kingdoms
http://roadsandkingdoms.com/2017/rebellion-in-pondoland/
The Pondoland Rebellion

The Star
http://www.iol.co.za/news/south-africa/gauteng/days-of-coal-mines-are-numbered-as-eskom-shifts-focus-8378695
Days of coal mines are numbered as Eskom shifts focus

http://www.iol.co.za/news/south-africa/north-west/a-trilogy-of-corruption-is-tearing-a-community-apart-8507543
A 'trilogy of corruption' is tearing a community apart

http://www.iol.co.za/news/south-africa/gauteng/the-dust-mountain-thats-just-always-there-9180268
The dust mountain that's just always there

http://www.iol.co.za/the-star/anglogold-pause-plans-for-mine-in-colombia-9601431
AngloGold pause plans for mine in Colombia

Saturday Star
A minefield of hope....and violence

Oxpeckers
http://oxpeckers.org/2017/04/coal-mines-legacy/
Coal mines leave a legacy of ruin
*republished in the Mail & Guardian and Fin24

http://oxpeckers.org/2017/05/r60-billion-held-mines-never-closed/
R60-billion held for mines that are never closed
*republished in Fin24

http://oxpeckers.org/2017/05/future-without-coal/
South Africa's future without coal

http://oxpeckers.org/2017/06/no-mining-at-mabola/
No mining at Mabola for 'the foreseeable future'
*republished in Fin24

Mining in South Africa is in for a wild ride in the coming years. New legislation, corruption, shifting markets and much more promise to significantly change the mining landscape. I look forward to reading stories from all the amazing journos and photogs with whom I worked these past years.

To hopefully lead to other reporters and researchers continuing this work, I made all the records I obtained from South Africa's Department of Mineral Resources public. My previous blog post (here: www.markolalde.com/south-africa/paia-day-transparencys-a-beautiful-thing) explains what documents are there and how to access them.

And finally, many thanks to all of you who came along for this investigation through your reads, comments, critiques and interest! Keep supporting journalism, and it will support you.
Sharp sharp!

Mark

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PAIA Day: Transparency's a Beautiful Thing

7/1/2017

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Documents. Beautiful, public documents.

Eita,
For the first half of 2017, Thursday mornings were for sitting in the office with a cup of freeze-dried, instant coffee. Its taste might've been lacking, but it got the job done. #PAIAday, as I called this weekly ritual, was my method for prying as much formerly secret information as possible from the country's Department of Mineral Resources (DMR) into the public domain. Between sips of coffee, I would call/email/pester every provincial DMR office on my list for the week. I wanted their documents.

I had my eyes on two main targets: closure certificates and financial provisions for rehabilitation. The latter are the funds set aside by a company in order to get a mining license and begin mining. Similar to a security deposit on an apartment (or "flat" for my British English-speaking fans), these funds cannot actually be used to clean up a site, but they are returned once the mine is closed and earns a closure certificate (this clear failure of the law will likely be amended soon). A closure certificate is a document for which a company applies to the DMR once a site is closed and rehabilitated. It is the key to getting that money back.

My tool for getting these documents was the Promotion of Access to Information Act, or PAIA (essentially the same thing as America's FOIA). In August 2015, I submitted seven PAIA requests to the DMR with assistance from Ms. Mariette Liefferink of the Federation for a Sustainable Environment. Although I later found out that some of my most important requests were granted by December 2015, when I returned to South Africa in late 2016, I was still without the vast majority of these documents.

That's when I decided to launch #PAIAday on the first working day of 2017. This exercise continued for six months. At the end of the process, I have unlocked an unprecedented (in this field, at least) haul of information. Eight of the nine provinces gave me the majority of their information, which I am making 100 percent public at the end of this post.

Johan Vos stands on the unremediated remains of a Golfview coal mine that scars his farm.

I published this information in a number of stories. In some, I analyzed the data and looked for province-wide or national patterns. In others, I used the data to investigate specific mines.

For example, the above and below photos come from abandoned operations formerly mined by Golfview Mining (Pty) Ltd that was part of Anker Coal and Mineral Holdings South Africa (Pty) Ltd that was part of the Netherlands-based Anker group. With a combination of these documents and others I accessed through well-placed sources, I discovered that in 2015 the mine sites had R622 million (+/- $47.6 million) in total liability, including R29 million (+/- $2.2 million) in environmental liability. An analysis of Mpumalanga's financial provision register revealed that related companies had 10 financial provisions for operations in the province with a grand total of no money in them.

This same exercise is possible (and waiting for you!) on numerous other companies and methods of mining around the country.

In a moment I'll get to where I compiled all the data, but you can also find much of this data in searchable/printable/downloadable Excel spreadsheets I built and published in a series of stories -- here, here and here -- with the Oxpeckers Center for Investigative Environmental Journalism.

And finally, one last thing before the explanation of how to access the data....I've compiled a list of who all the current DMR PAIA officers are (that I know of), so you, too, can submit requests (if they are not the PAIA officer, I have explained their position):

national office
Mr. Diphoko Modiselle
diphoko.modiselle@dmr.gov.za
+27 (0)12 444 3284
+27 (0)82 821 1198

Mr. Pieter Alberts (Modiselle's boss and the DMR's head of legal)
pieter.alberts@dmr.gov.za
+27 (0)12 444 3288

www.dmr.gov.za/contact-us.html
This link will take you to the DMR's contact page where you can find phone numbers for each office.

Gauteng
Ms. Rachel Mkhari
rachel.Mkhari@dmr.gov.za

Mr. Jimmy Sekgale (in charge of compiling certain financial records)
jimmy.sekgale@dmr.gov.za
+27 (0)11 358 9700/9773

Free State
Ms. Mathapelo Mofikadi
mathapelo.mofikadi@dmr.gov.za
+27 (0)57 391 1389

Mpumalanga
Mr. Siyabonga Panduva
siyabonga.panduva@dmr.gov.za

Ms. Puja Singh (Panduva's boss)
puja.singh@dmr.gov.za

Ms. Onicca Mahlangu (in charge of compiling financial records)
onicca.mahlangu@dmr.gov.za

Limpopo
Mr. Robert Munyadziwa
robert.munyadziwa@dmr.gov.za
+27 (0)15 287 4738

North West
Mr. Abel Mandlazi
abel.mandlazi@dmr.gov.za
+27 (0)18 487 4302

Western Cape
Mr. Mervin Petro
mervin.petro@dmr.gov.za
+27 (0)21 427 1039

Eastern Cape & KwaZulu-Natal
Unclear. Call their offices or Modiselle.

Northern Cape (split between two regional offices)
Kimberley office
Mr. Luzuko Nxantsiya
luzuko.nxantsiya@dmr.gov.za

Springbok office
Mr. Jasper Nieuwoudt (regional manager)
jasper.nieuwoudt@dmr.gov.za
+27 (0)82 461 7226

Ms. Linda Njemla <Linda.Njemla@dmr.gov.za>,
Ms. Deidre Karsten <Deidre.Karsten@dmr.gov.za>,
Ms. Joleen Engelbrecht <Joleen.Engelbrecht@dmr.gov.za>
*Positions for these three are unclear, but they are involved.

Coal that was illegally dug by small-scale miners at an abandoned Golfview operation in Mpumalanga.

Now the fun part....

My work in South Africa is over for now, so I am making all this information 100 percent, absolutely, totally public. Below, you will find a link to a Dropbox folder that contains everything I got from the DMR. You are more than welcome to share it. You don't need a Dropbox account to access the data. Simply click the link or copy and paste the URL into your browser. The Word document entitled _South Africa mine closure data explains everything that is in the folder. If anything remains unclear, I am available to explain the data further. That's it. Let's get to work.

www.dropbox.com/sh/jiumw7nhocsplhj/AAA9ua8rqpVkc7rlD8hUpsxKa?dl=0

Sharp sharp,
Mark

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The void, dust, gold and powering the Rainbow Nation: An online photography exhibit

5/11/2017

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THE VOID, DUST, GOLD AND POWERING THE RAINBOW NATION is an online photography exhibit of my work, a project that was to be supported by Wits University but died in academia's relentless bureaucracy. Instead of letting my work die with it, I am trying something new....

This exhibit was born from my journalistic view of South African mining and studied through the literal lens of my camera. The evolution of my reporting led me to attempt a more nuanced view of the interconnected activities and consequences of minerals extraction, the primary intention of this experiment.

I question: What are the common experiences placed upon South Africa and its inhabitants by resource extraction? This question leads to other threads: the direct impacts of mining on local communities and environments, the responsibility of companies and government, the impact of race on power within the mining industry, the influence of international markets on far-removed communities and the part played by the rest of the country.

Many of these relationships become so powerful because of their juxtaposition. Instead of forcing these juxtapositions in individual frames, though, I am highlighting relationships through the physical (well, electronic at least) space of the exhibit. Note the individual clusters of (low resolution) frames to come. Each will come with a main photograph and with the surrounding shots (in different physical and theoretical manners) relating back to it.

As South Africa aspires to join the First World, the nation struggles with a history that includes colonialism, migrant labor and apartheid. This Rainbow Nation -- with its heartbeat in a city named for one of the very resources that built it -- cannot simply untangle itself from this complicated past and the industry that reinforced its prejudices. Instead, I hope this exhibit might add one more data point to the discussion surrounding remediation of the mining industry's fallout...

Remnants: Gold mine waste is strewn across the West Rand

Forced Coexistence: An unrehabilitated gold mine scars Johannesburg

Amadiba

Complex Power Complex: Sasol's Secunda coal and chemicals refinery operates in Mpumalanga

Legality: An informal settlement housing zama zamas on the Blyvooruitzicht Gold Mine

Alternative Mining Indaba protester

After Tears: A shaft rises from the ruins of a former gold mine

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South Africa's Traditional Authorities

5/5/2017

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Platinum mining in the North West.

Eita,
The tendrils of apartheid cruelly cling to life, having scratched their way into South Africa's psyche. The evidence -- especially with my work focusing on mining -- permeates everyday life.

I recently examined one aspect of this situation: communal land rights. Legislation passed in the lead-up to apartheid and continually refined during that time created 10 "bantustans" or "homelands" that accounted for 13 percent of the country's land. The racist social architects governing this period of the country's history selected this 13 percent because it was far from city centers and was, at the time, of little to no economic importance. During apartheid, these areas were encouraged to become "independent," a method of removing any responsibility from the government. The rest of the world, however, saw through the facade and did not recognize "bantustans" as countries.

While some of these areas loosely coincide with actual tribes -- i.e. the amaPondo people lived in the eastern part of the country prior to these areas being demarcated, as did the Zulu people -- arbitrary boundaries were placed on top of them. In the spirit of this falsely proclaimed self-governance, the government installed pawns as leaders in many of these areas. Since the advent of democracy, though, the democratically elected government catastrophically failed to return rights to people on communal land. Instead, laws passed by the African National Congress ("the party of Mandela") entrenched the boundaries of "bantustans" and allowed the traditional authorities of these areas -- many of whom had their lineage installed during apartheid -- to remain in positions of power. While reviews are ongoing to determine rightful leaders and family lines, they are woefully behind schedule and in some cases are essentially censored by officials.

Now, in a manner nearly identical to the U.S. forcing the relocation of American Indians to barren reservations and later finding gold and oil, companies operating in South Africa are trying to mine on land inhabited by people who were already once forcibly relocated.

Homes along the coast in Amadiba, Eastern Cape.

Companies from -- or with executives from and other strong ties to -- countries including Australia, Canada and the U.S. identify areas of communal land with potential mineral wealth and cut deals with traditional authorities. Although traditional authorities do not have the power to make such deals, some companies provide cash and other incentives to these leaders to act as if the community supports a mining project.

An estimated 18 million people live in these communal areas. I wrote this piece for Roads & Kingdoms about the Amadiba community in the Eastern Cape where several community activists have been murdered, likely due to their opposition to one such project. This piece for The Star highlights the Bapong community in North West that saw millions of dollars belonging to the community disappear as its traditional authorities cut a deal with one of the world's largest platinum group metals (PGM) miners.

Experts have identified what some call a "trilogy of corruption," in which the provincial government, the mining company and the traditional authorities collude. Its existence can be difficult to prove, while its impacts are quite obvious. Now, a new bill is proposed in Parliament that would further these leaders' power. It remains unclear when or how full, legal rights might be returned to the millions of South Africans living on communal land.
Sharp sharp,

Mark

Housing near Bapong, North West.

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Photo of the Week: People

5/1/2017

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Eita,
My work covering South African mining in 2016/17 largely began at the South African Human Rights Commission's hearing on mining-affected communities last year. The commission's investigation fits with a trend of more focus being placed on the impacts of the country's mining industry on both the populations near operations as well as the rest of the country. To tell environmental stories, I usually need to turn to a human face (many other environmental reporters often turn to an animal one instead) as an anecdote for the impacts of x, y or z. The commission's hearings brought an outpouring of stories from people directly impacted by mining, and those threads are what garnered public attention.

Pictured above, Mbolwa Divele lives about a kilometer inland on the Wild Coast in the Eastern Cape. I interviewed him and his brother, who lives one hill over from Mbolwa, about a titanium mine that is proposed not far from their homes. This specific fight gained international attention when the leader of a group called the Amadiba Crisis Committee, which leads the anti-mining movement there, was murdered. Now, another member of the committee has stood up to address the public, a tactic that has proven to work well with journalists.

In all these environmental stories, people are affected somehow, and their stories require careful investigation and coverage. For that reason, my last Photo of the Week from several years of work in South Africa is simply "people."
Sharp sharp,

Mark

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South Africa

Recapping the Project

PAIA Day: Transparency's a Beautiful Thing

The void, dust, gold and powering the Rainbow Nation: An online photography exhibit

South Africa's Traditional Authorities

Photo of the Week: People

Mark Olalde

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