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Johannesburg - South African companies forming "cartels" to strip Zimbabwe and the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) of their raw materials will be brought to book.
On Thursday, this warning came from senior Cosatu spokesperson Bongani Masuku. He was addressing a forum of expatriate Zimbabweans at the University of the Witwatersrand, and said such companies represented a threat to democracy in southern Africa.
Together with unions in neighbouring states, an investigation will be launched into these companies, and this will be discussed during a regional union conference in September.
He was referring to the current debate about the sale of Zimbabwean diamonds and the so-called Kimberley Process, and held that certain companies were bent on making money from the “militarised elite” who assert their right to the raw materials of Zimbabwe and other southern African countries.
He said the unions would see to it that the accumulation of resources and raw materials is democratised. There is a big difference between a junta elite (such as in Zimbabwe) and a democratic elite that controls national assets and benefits from them.
Blood diamonds in the spotlight
Diamonds being mined in southern Africa will be specifically investigated. Masuku says 87% of those currently in world trade originate from the Southern African Development Community (SADC), and many of these are blood diamonds.
Masuku says mining cartels are also engaged in an unseemly quest for Angola’s mineral riches. This, too, will be looked into.
The purpose of the investigation into the cartels is to single out the companies concerned and, he declares, expose them.
But Cosatu’s sights are set not only on private mining companies. Steps will also be taken to tackle SADC political leaders who fail to protect their workers from exploitation in the mines.
SADC will be put on the spot.
Masuku says that during the SADC leadership conference in Windhoek later this year, Cosatu and other unions in southern Africa will make sure that the 14 heads of state will be called to account because mining proceeds are not reaching their people.
- Sake24.com
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