Sponsor our golf day or else! Extortion has entered silly season

South Africa’s mining sector has long faced extortion threats from “community forums” and various mafias seeking a slice of its lucrative procurement pie. But as the general election approaches, Sibanye-stillwater CEO Neal Froneman says the “silly season” has kicked off.

“You have ‘community members’ now getting into silly season and trying to demand the use of their products and even to sponsor golf days,” Froneman told Daily Maverick on 10 April on the sidelines of the PGMS Industry Day conference organised by Resources For Africa.

Froneman declined to name the group that made the demand, but said it was present around the company’s gold operations in the West Wits region. And it has not been lost on chancers that gold’s price is at record levels.

“They see the profitability and the prices, and it being in the silly season they think it’s their right to extort. Because that’s what it is – it’s extortion. By silly season I mean lots of politics leading up to the election.

“They even write letters to the [Department of Mineral Resources and Energy] and they involve the minister, reporting on this company for not playing ball. It’s harassment,” Froneman said.

In dealing with crime, Froneman said there had been improvements on other fronts and that the business-government workstream on crime was slowly yielding results. He also noted progress with the workstreams focused on the logistics and power crises.

“There is still good collaboration. There have been some good results in terms of infrastructure protection and improvements in rail lines and so on. But it’s up and down.

“All the workstreams are progressing. We have seen a reduction in load shedding. I get asked is that because of the elections, and no, it’s fundamental improvements in supply.”

The Business Against Crime initiative has had its first board meeting and Froneman was nominated to chair it this year.

But he noted the challenge was massive in the face of a fragile socioeconomic environment. “Underlying social issues are getting worse. People are getting poorer, the cost of living is rising, theft is increasing,” Froneman said.

“Until you address poverty, you are not really going to address crime.”

Of course, those demanding sponsorship for a golf day are not driven by poverty. But such vultures can exploit the poverty of communities to tee up protests that disrupt mining operations.

As the elections loom, expect the demands of silly season to get sillier as the criminals seek a hole-in-one.