Gold and silicosis - South African gold miners proceed with class action suit against mining firms
David McKenzie and Ingrid Formanek, CNN
Welkom, South Africa
The most striking thing
about Joseph Mothibedi is his voice -- it is raspy, a metallic whisper. It's the sound of a
man slowly dying. His thin fingers
trembling, Mothibedi leans over his simple hot plate and puts a tea kettle on
the boil.
The 58-year-old former
gold miner looks reduced in his old blue work shirt. It hangs off his bony
shoulders as he spreads margarine on a slice of white bread for afternoon tea.
He slowly sips it in his barren brick house near an old mine-dump. "Just listen to my
voice," he says, "I have problems with my lungs. I can't even walk
fast or far. It is very hard for me." Mothibedi is stricken
with silicosis, an incurable lung condition that affects gold miners in
southern Africa.
An incurable burden
Silicosis develops
over long periods of time. Fine silica dust lodges deep inside miners' lungs as
they extract gold, day after day, year after year. As the silica
particles accumulate, lung function becomes severely limited. The miners have
shortness of breath, lose weight, become prone to heart disease and, in the
most severe cases, an early death. Several studies
estimate that there are at least two hundred thousand current and former miners
in the region suffering from the disease. Researchers have called it a
pandemic.
On Friday, thousands
of gold miners were given the go ahead to proceed with their landmark class
action suit -- the biggest in South
Africa's history -- against mining firms. South Gauteng High
Court Judge Phineas Mojapelo ruled that there is "sufficient common action
to satisfy a class action."
"Almost the
entire gold mining industry is involved in this case. The scope and magnitude
of the proposed silicosis case is unprecedented," said Mojapelo. The suit, in part
backed by prominent U.S. litigation firm Motley Rice, alleges that the
companies should have known the harmful effects of silica dust in their mines
and didn't do enough to stop it.
The South African
Chamber of Mines, which counts several of the defendants in the suit as its
members, told CNN that the companies have been working to improve dust
management and eliminate silicosis risks and are offering to set up a medical
fund for the plaintiffs in the case. "The companies
are all defending themselves in the class action. However, they do recognize
that silicosis is a significant legacy issue," says Alan Fine, a spokesman
for the industry group.
But Doctor Rhett Kahn
doubts the sincerity of those companies. He has treated silicosis patients for
decades. "The companies
don't care about the miners, their dust levels are high. I believe they are
illegally high," Kahn says. "In a country that is supposed to be the
democratic flagship of the world, this is totally unacceptable." Kahn and his wife
Janet run a small general practice clinic in Welkom, a somewhat faded mining
town that was once a thriving center of the gold industry that is long past its
boom years.
Miners, many too sick
to work, come to Kahn's busy practice from around Welkom, but also from
neighboring Mozambique and Lesotho to get help. Janet guides them through the
maze of medical paperwork. Rhett says they sometimes wait here for days.
A history of neglect?
The history of gold
mining in South Africa is one of riches and neglect. The veins of gold
found in the Witwatersrand in the late 1800s sparked a gold rush that
transformed the country's largely agricultural economy into an industrial
powerhouse. In 1970, more than 20 percent of South Africa's GDP depended on the
mining sector, including gold. Lately, its importance is much diminished.
The foundation of
South Africa's wealth was built on the backs of black miners. Mining industry
segregation was a crucial element in the racist policies that culminated in
decades of apartheid rule. Despite the risks,
millions of black migrant workers from rural South Africa and neighboring
states flooded the mines as cheap labor.
Until 1993, white
miners were paid substantially higher compensation for silicosis-related
illnesses. According to researchers like Jock McCulloch, silicosis rates were
vastly underestimated among black miners for decades. McCulloch and other
researchers say that the rates haven't got any better since apartheid ended more
than twenty years ago. "It's as bad as
it was during apartheid," says Kahn.
Miners with proven
silicosis can apply for compensation from a government fund -- but many die
before the complicated paperwork is complete. Mothibedi says he got
a one-time payment of around 5,000 dollars in 2008. It was meant to last him a
lifetime. Now, he depends on disability grants.
When Mothibedi grew up
in nearby Lesotho, he saw the mines as the only opportunity to further himself. "When I started
to work in the mines I wanted to just make money and go back to school and
study," he says. "But when I started seeing people making money I
thought I could save money and start my own business." He slowly moved up to
one of the few more senior jobs at the mines that black miners could hope to
get during apartheid, all the while sucking in the dust that that would ruin
his lungs. Silicosis put an end
to Mothibedi's dreams. "I feel helpless.
This sickness has destroyed everything in my life," he says.
