David McKay writes that the Labour Court has delivered a potentially important judgement in favour of mining companies seeking less drastic application of the Mine Health and Safety Act (MHSA) by the Department of Mineral Affairs (DMR).  

The court ruled that the DMR had ignored the notion of “proportionality” when it issued a Section 54 notice shutting AngloGold Ashanti’s Kopanang mine last month.  In other words, the DMR had acted wrongly in shutting the entire mine when transgressions of the act had only occurred on level 44, which employed 2% of Kopanang’s entire 4218 employees.  The judge ruled that no circumstance existed on level 44 which rendered the whole mining operation unsafe, or on which the senior inspector of mines for the North West province could rely to infer that not only 44 level was unsafe, but the whole mine.

• Read this report in full at Miningmx

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