More than R30-billion is waiting to be claimed and paid out to former mineworkers, mostly from the Eastern Cape, but the government and mining houses are struggling to trace them or their kin.
Minister in the Presidency, Jeff Radebe was speaking at the weekend at the funeral of Nominethi Sehli Salakuphathwa at the Nqadu Great Place near Willowvale on Saturday, attended by 5000 people.
The minister appealed to traditional leaders to help find the beneficiaries or their nearest kin.
Salakuphathwa, a well-known businesswoman and community builder, was the wife of AmaXhosa King Mpendulo Sigcawu’s uncle, Chief Zanenkululeko Salakuphathwa.
She died in a car accident on July 19.
Radebe said: “Recently, the Department of Mineral Resources embarked on the tracing of beneficiaries of the provident funds that have been kept by some mining companies and fund managers for ages.
“For a long time there has been lethargy on the part of the mining houses, provident funds and fund managers to trace these deserving beneficiaries.
“It seems to me that the tracing system is very efficient when it looks for people who should pay but very weak when it should trace people who should be paid,” said the minister.
Radebe said most of the miners were recruited through the TEBA system, and most were from the areas under the control of traditional authorities.
He said tracing them or their kin was “not an insurmountable task”.
Many former mineworkers were infected with mine-related diseases and many others had died, he said. “While dispensing these monies to the rightful beneficiaries will not change the structural economic inequalities overnight, they will go a long way towards addressing the present economic dire circumstances these beneficiaries face,” said the minister. King Sigcawu applauded the government for its effort to develop rural areas, but he and other speakers also had a strong message for the state: “We cannot have the Zulu King treated differently and better than any others…We must be like King Zwelithini and have a budget and our spouses taken care of.” — lulamilef@ dispatch.co.za
Call for R30bn to be claimed
Minister in the Presidency, Jeff Radebe was speaking at the weekend at the funeral of Nominethi Sehli Salakuphathwa at the Nqadu Great Place near Willowvale on Saturday, attended by 5000 people.
The minister appealed to traditional leaders to help find the beneficiaries or their nearest kin.
Salakuphathwa, a well-known businesswoman and community builder, was the wife of AmaXhosa King Mpendulo Sigcawu’s uncle, Chief Zanenkululeko Salakuphathwa.
She died in a car accident on July 19.
Radebe said: “Recently, the Department of Mineral Resources embarked on the tracing of beneficiaries of the provident funds that have been kept by some mining companies and fund managers for ages.
“For a long time there has been lethargy on the part of the mining houses, provident funds and fund managers to trace these deserving beneficiaries.
“It seems to me that the tracing system is very efficient when it looks for people who should pay but very weak when it should trace people who should be paid,” said the minister.
Radebe said most of the miners were recruited through the TEBA system, and most were from the areas under the control of traditional authorities.
He said tracing them or their kin was “not an insurmountable task”.
Many former mineworkers were infected with mine-related diseases and many others had died, he said. “While dispensing these monies to the rightful beneficiaries will not change the structural economic inequalities overnight, they will go a long way towards addressing the present economic dire circumstances these beneficiaries face,” said the minister. King Sigcawu applauded the government for its effort to develop rural areas, but he and other speakers also had a strong message for the state: “We cannot have the Zulu King treated differently and better than any others…We must be like King Zwelithini and have a budget and our spouses taken care of.” — lulamilef@ dispatch.co.za
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