He said the people being murdered were those who “work for the opposing company who got the job and you didn’t get it. So there’s a real culture there of fear and intimidation. We know that police have arrested, belatedly after a lot of pushing and prodding from our side, 25 people connected with theft of coal and they have shut down three illegal blending sites and we understand there are 30 more of these blending sites.
“This is where they take our good coal, they offload it, and then they replace our coal with discard coal which is essentially just rock with a bit of coal mixed in. And that doesn’t burn so well first of all and, secondly, it damages our equipment, so that’s a major contributor to load shedding.” Crime and insecurity have been common themes at the Indaba, casting host South Africa and its mining sector in an unflattering light.Sibanye’s Froneman says SA’s mining sector is being hammered by the scourge of crime“I’ve been quite vocal about coal theft for a long time and it’s been quite an effort to get law enforcement to do what they’re supposed to.
Returning to his poisoning, De Ruyter reiterated that he believes that it was a deliberate attempt on his life and that he “got lucky”.DM/BM
We are also not impressed by his leadership.