GroundUp reports that about 50 people picketed outside the Cape Town International Convention Centre (CTICC) on Wednesday, where the annual Mining Indaba conference was underway.
The group called for justice following the Stilfontein mining tragedy. Placards read: “Justice for the miners”, “Cops protect capital not people”, and “Nobody is illegal”. Last month, more than 240 zama zamas (illegal miners) were rescued and about 78 bodies were retrieved from the abandoned North West mineshaft. The miners had been trapped underground for months, with little to no access to food, water and medication. Speaking to the crowd outside the indaba, Gabriel Klaasen – from the African Climate Alliance – called for justice to be done and reparations to be paid to the families of the Stilfontein miners who lost their lives. He accused the government of xenophobia, racism and Afrophobia in its response to the events that unfolded at the illegal mining site. David Le Page, director of Fossil Free SA, said what happened in Stilfontein was an “absolute outrage”. “In a constitutional democracy, the life of every single human being should be equally sacred and treated with the same importance by every organ of the state, which is the very opposite of what we’ve seen happen,” he said.
- Read the full original of the report in the above regard by Liezl Human at GroundUp
- Read too, Activists picket in Cape Town in solidarity with Stilfontein illegal miners, at EWN
Get other news reports at the SA Labour News home page