part of no part

In a recent opinion piece, the Deputy Secretary General (DSG) of the ANC, Jessie Duarte, asked a pertinent question with regards to the Mining Sector. Is South Africa benefiting enough from extraction of its resources? While we are delighted that such a senior leader of the majority Party would publicly question the efficacy of mining and its benefit to South Africa and its people, there remains a significant disconnect between the rhetoric that emerges from the governing party and the policies and legislation which entrenches and enables the deep and historical inequality of the past to continue into the future. The DSG approvingly quotes the Minister of Mineral Resources, Mosebenzi Zwane as saying that “With an estimated $2.5 trillion (R30 trillion) to $3 trillion in non-energy mineral reserves still in situ, we are looking forward to another 150 years of mining in South Africa,…[a]s we move mining forward, let’s take everyone along and ensure that the mineral wealth bene...

*First published http://m.news24.com/news24/Columnists/GuestColumn/natural-resources-must-be-shared-20170922 The primary objectives of the Minerals Petroleum Resources Development Act (MPRDA), which governs the mining Industry, are to: ·          Promote equitable access to the nations mineral and petroleum resources. ·          Substantially and meaningfully expand opportunities for Historically Disadvantaged Persons. ·          Promote employment and advance the social and economic welfare of all South Africans. With this in mind, one would assume that after 15 years of implementation that significant strides would have been made in bringing these objectives closer to realisation. Yet it appears that after all this time, access to the nations minerals are controlled with the intent and purpose, not of allowing greater access, but of protect...

As we pass through another cycle of remembering our heritage, it would appear as if now is as good a time as any, to lance a few pus-filled cysts that continue to hinder the emergence of a discourse or discourses, which could help to heal the ailing body which we today call South Africa. Race, and the ever elusive national question, the ebullient idea of the rainbow nation, appear to be slowly receding into the back alleys of history, to lurk there in the shadows, and to haunt us, like the unfulfilled promise of a lover. In its place, growing stronger by the day and being fed with more and more urgency, stands a familiar shape of a dark history we had thought was forever banished…..”never and never again”, echoes, Madiba`s words. Like a mirror image, whose reflection we cannot escape, the deep and pervasive logic of race, has and continues to deeply imbue our lived realities in ways that mimics the logic, reactions and ideology of the past. This is not to say that a...