If you’re planning to get rid of troublesome waste like paint thinners or oil by pouring it down the drain or dumping it in the veld, watch out — you may end up with some kick-arse dirt busters on your case.
This is the message of a court case last Friday, in which an East London pub owner was fined R100 000 for burying drums of hazardous waste on his property.
Legislation has given environmental watchdogs teeth — and Minister of Environmental Affairs and Tourism Marthinus van Schalkwyk is about to give the watchdogs the power to use them.
Among the dirt-busters are two dynamic female lawyers, central to the team that charged pub owner Darryl Tucker with illegal dumping. After fighting them for almost two years, Tucker finally pleaded guilty. In addition to the fine, he was sentenced to five years in jail, suspended for five years, and ordered not to sell his property until the director general of environmental affairs is satisfied it has been cleaned up.
Aarti Brijlall, assistant director of regulatory services in the Department of Environmental Affairs and Tourism, was the Tucker case officer from 2003. With a master’s degree in law, specialising in human rights and democratisation in Africa, she did an internship with Johnny de Lange, advocate and now deputy justice minister, before joining the department.
Melissa Fourie, the acting director of enforcement, was a commercial litigator before earning a master’s degree in environment and development at the London School of Economics. She worked for the World Conservation Union (IUCN) for a year before joining the government.
”They are our barracuda lawyers,” says Peter Lukey, the chief director of regulatory services. ”We put them on to cases of non-compliance and say, ‘Sic!’.”
Lukey added that for many years the government was seen as unwilling or unable to enforce waste and pollution regulations. ”Technicians who know nothing about legal procedures were trying to do the job. You need lawyers and inspectors with specialist knowledge.”
Tucker was bust after a tip-off from an ex-employee. He had buried hundreds of drums of thinners and paint sludge, which he got from car manufacturers and promised to recycle.
At his pub, The Reeds, he now serves a cocktail, reflecting his new awareness, called ”toxic shock”. In court papers he says he will struggle to pay the fine and that the ”negative publicity and criminal prosecution have had a traumatic effect … which will remain for a very long time”.
Brijlall said this week that she hoped the case would send a powerful message ”that the polluter does, indeed, pay and that there are severe punishments for those who intentionally pollute the environment”.
The dirt-busters have been able to flex their muscle since an amendment to the National Environmental Management Act in 2003 gave environmental management inspectors powers of search and seizure. Nicknamed the Green Scorpions, they have been setting up networks and collaborating with other provincial and national government bodies.
During World Environment Week (from June 5) Van Schalkwyk is expected to recognise the Green Scorpions formally and confer official enforcement powers on them.
Fourie says her directorate is investigating up to 50 cases, ”including 10 to 12 big ones. We prefer to concentrate on high-profile, significant cases that set a precedent.”
One big case involves Vesuvius, the country’s largest refractory manufacturer of iron and steel. After the department threatened to close the company because of its air pollution, Vesuvius launched a court appeal and then undertook to clean up its act last year.
Other cases under investigation include one in Mpumalanga, where farmers are illegally planting invasive alien trees in endangered grasslands, and one in the Free State revolving around the dumping of hundreds of drums of waste oil by garages and mines.
Illegal collection of waste tyres, often by people who burn them to get the metal, is a looming clash. There are perennial problems with illegal asbestos use and water pollution. And car manufacturers are only too happy to pass on their hazardous problems.
Fourie, a petite blonde, says the directorate does not want to be seen as a bunch of ”heavies with guns and flak jackets. Our aim is to be firm but fair. As long as people play the game, we will assist them. But, if not, we will come after them.”
The directorate of regulatory services was the brainchild of Lukey, a co-founder of environmental NGO Earthlife Africa in the 1980s and one of the whistle-blowers who exposed mercury pollution at the Thor chemical plant in Cato Ridge.
It is a unique network of legal experts with government cooperation. Training and advice has been provided by enforcement agencies in the United States, United Kingdom, Denmark and The Netherlands.
Lukey is moving on in June to head the department’s air quality management unit — another area of growing environmental conflict. He points out that many of the larger air polluters, particularly corporations, avoid trouble by meeting the conditions set out in their permits.
”They are not breaking the law, so we have to look at other strategies for dealing with this,” he says. ”The law provides us with the tools to start reviewing the permits, so this is where we’ll start.”