Notice of broadcast - Fokus,
Sunday, SABC 2
At 18h30 on Sunday, 8 June 2014, SABC2’s Fokus current
affairs programme will broadcast a documentary about plans for the Fuleni
Anthracite Mine just outside the south-eastern border of the Hluhluwe-iMfolozi
Park – and opposition to two other mines, also in northern KZN.
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Dear WESSA Members
WESSA OBJECTION AGAINST FULENI
ANTHRACITE COAL MINE APPLICATION
WESSA is
deeply concerned about the application by the company Ibutho Coal to
develop an anthracite coal mine right on the boundary of the
world-renown Hluhluwe-iMfolozi Park. This proposed Fuleni Mine
has the potential to cause severe and irreversible impacts on this
flagship nature reserve and the communities of the Fuleni- Umhlana
area.
WESSA opposes Ibutho Coal’s application to open-pit mine within 30-70m
of the Park fenceline. Undoubtedly the noise, blasting, vibrations and
other impacts of the will have a severe adverse impact. The managers of
HIP, Ezemvelo KZN Wildlife, have reported that two existing mines
situated much further away from the Park fenceline than that of the
proposed Fuleni Mine, already adversely impact on the HIP’s fauna and
tourism.
We cannot ignore how acid mine leachate has polluted wide areas from so
many of South Africa’s mines; threatening our scarce water resources
and community health. The proximity of this proposed mine poses a
serious acid mine leachate risk to the Park.
Of critical concern to WESSA is the strong likelihood that the mine
will lead to an increase in poaching in the Park. Ezemvelo reports that
the rhino population of the HIP is already under serious threat by
poachers. WESSA has been intimately involved in trying to protect rhino
and elephants from poaching since the early 1980s, and holds that this
increased risk should not even be tolerated.
WESSA fully supports the motions of objection filed by Ezemvelo and the
Save our iMfolozi Wilderness Alliance against this application, and we
have submitted an objection to the Minister of Mineral Resources,
Minister Ngoako Ramatlhodi. WESSA has called on him to implement his
Ministry’s pledge last year that “some places are sacrosanct – they
have such high conservation value that we together commit not to
disturb!”. We have also called on the National Ministers of Environment
Affairs and Tourism to persuade the Department of Mineral Resources to
recognise the Hluhluwe-iMfolozi Park as being one of these sacrosanct
places; and that Ibutho Coal be required to forego mining with the
buffer area of this Park.
Yours in sustainable development,
Morgan Griffiths
WESSA
Environmental Governance Programme Manager
Tel: 041 5859606
Email: morgan.griffiths@wessa.co.za
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