Spoor explains the charges due to be laid on Friday by the department: “There are two charges as far as we understand, both on the violation of the water use licence. The first is that the dam should have been closed in 2020 as it was the end of its designed life, and they didn’t do that. The second thing is there was a strict limitation on how much waste could be dumped on the dam.
“They were supposed to take out the sand so that the dam itself becomes strong. Because you can’t close mud with sand. At a particular point even when it’s raining, these workers are telling us that the wall is coming down, they were always indicating such things. There are a lot of hazards and risks that were not taken care of by the mine bosses, what they care for is profit,” says Naki.
The mine’s legal compliance officer, Marius de Villiers, said they complied with all safety measures. “A new licence was issued and that licence was what we operated on up until now and we have complied with all those conditions, that’s why I am saying the last and I have said it previously as well, the last engineering report that was submitted by the mine was in June because we have to do that quarterly. We have complied with that,” added De Villiers.Share article