Shabangu takes aim at RBCT

Cape Town - The coal mining sector must resolve the problems experienced by small producers and aspirant exporters through the privately owned and operated Richards Bay Coal Terminal (RBCT), Mineral Resources Minister Susan Shabangu said on Thursday.

Speaking at the Coal Exporters Conference Shabangu said: "There are certain elements who seem determined to keep competition out by either denying junior miners allocations or charging them exorbitant prices for access to this facility."

Richards Bay Coal Terminal has Anglo American, BHP Billiton, Kanga Coal, Sasol Mining and Xstrata among its shareholders. The terminal exported 65.5 million tons of coal in 2011.

Shabangu said she hoped the coal mining sector would do something more tangible and inclusive to alleviate the plight of the junior operators who also find it difficult to access funding for their exploration and mining activities.

BEE undermined

"This leads to some of these players selling their properties prematurely, which defeats the objective of raising levels of participation of BEE (Black Economic Empowerment) in the sector," she said.

Shabangu bemoaned what she called the continued reliance of the sector on the previously advantaged 20% of the population, obsessed with a bottom line approach at the expense of national objectives, and that it had undermined the objectives of this sector.

"We need to use the wilfully excluded vast human capital to devise a truly South African solution to the challenges facing this sector. More disappointing is the habit of most BEE companies merely to buy these assets and yet still perpetuate the pre-1994 trend, in terms of their asset management and control," she said.

Shabangu claimed there were certain elements that seem determined to keep competition out by either denying junior miners allocations or charging them exorbitant prices for access to this facility.

"I hope the sector will do something more tangible and inclusive to alleviate the plight of the junior operators. Additionally, these junior operators tend to find it difficult to access funding for their exploration and mining activities," she said.

Shabangu said that the industry would be keenly following the deliberations of the ANC during the course of this year as they would have an important bearing on the coal industry.

The ANC has been investigating the nationalisation of the mining sector over the past year and its report should be included in a number of policy documents that were to be distributed to its branches in preparation for its July policy congress.