Gwede’s take on mining rights stuns

Looking at South African politics, you can get the feeling you have ended up in the Twilight Zone. Sadly, though, the “you cannot possibly make this up” nature of our society means that even the seemingly unbelievable is actually happening. Take the case of Mining Minister Gwede Mantashe, who is going to challenge a court judgment which gives a rural community, in Xolobeni on the Wild Coast, the effective right to say “no” to mining in its area. His – and by that we mean the ANC’s government’s – argument is that granting mining rights does not interfere with rights of ownership or use of land.

Tell that, Mr Mantashe, to someone who is now unable to plant crops or graze cattle because an Australian mining giant has gouged out a massive pit in the middle of what were once farming lands.

The irony is all the more rich because the Xolobeni people fought to defend their land against the colonial masters in the Pondo Revolt. Now they have vowed to fight once more – against Mantashe and the ANC.

The further irony is that the ANC has pledged to right the wrongs of the past and return the land to the people … except, apparently, when the people are sitting atop a field of treasure which can make foreigners rich.

Even more bizarre is the minister’s contention that the judgment gives traditional, rural communities more legal rights than farmers – many of whom are white and the target of land expropriation without compensation.

The saga – and the parallel obscene haste to push through the equally contentious N2 highway (to allow easy transport of the minerals hauled out of lands like the Xolobeni area) – has uncomfortable echoes of the e-toll scandal, where the ANC ignored the public voice and bent over backwards to accommodate overseas big business.