Eddie Koch
WHY did only black workers die in last week’s tragedy? The National Union of Mineworkers (NUM) says it is because racial segregation is still rife on the mines. The charge is denied by the owners of the Vaal Reefs Gold Mine.
Union officials say black and white mineworkers are hoisted separately on many mines. The result is that lift cages, especially for unskilled underground workers, seldom have white miners in them.
“Management usually explains this on the grounds of skill,” says Fleur Plimmer, the NUM’s national health and safety co-ordinator. “But the reality is that there are no unskilled white mineworkers and very few skilled black miners at this stage.”
She added that other areas of the industry were also still segregated along racial lines. This includes the hostels, where there are only black migrants, and some canteens.
“Queuing is especially a racial flashpoint, both for the lifts and at other areas like canteens. We have experienced a number of sit-ins underground because of white workers jumping the rows waiting for the lifts, and we don’t know of white workers who wait in long lines for food.”
Viv du Plessis, senior manpower consultant for the Anglo American Corporation, responded by saying the only area of “de facto” segregation was in mine hostels. “This is not, however, determined by mine policy, but is rather due to traditional employment and recruiting practices.
“Other areas which you mention, such as hospitals, hoisting arrangements and accommodation other than mine hostels, are integrated. All our mines have formal or informal arrangements to ensure that the lowering or raising of men is not racially segregated.
“The Gold and Uranium Division would like to believe that we are making progress in the area of employment equity in general … We have a lot of work to do but are pleased with the training of black miners, artisans, metallurgists, surveyors and human resource management staff …
“We do, however, in some cases hoist people doing different tasks at different times. For example, artisans have different underground working hours to miners, who are again different to, say, middle managers … It is possible that a shaft conveyance (lift) which is busy lowering stope workers might well contain only black employees, while a conveyance lowering a group of middle managers might contain only white employees.”
The Leon Commission’s report also looks at the issue of segregation on the mines: “For many years the Chamber of Mines expressed its opposition to the apartheid system but, even today, with apartheid ended, there exists a hangover from that system in the mining industry, where, by and large, black workers are at the bottom of the organisational pyramid, while white workers are further