Legal Resources Centre (Johannesburg)
21 April 2011
press release
On 21 April London-based Anglo American PLC will hold its Annual General Meeting. Anglo PLC owns Anglo American South Africa Ltd, the Johannesburg-based former Anglo head office company until 1998. Anglo SA is the defendant in 18 silicosis test cases, brought by former gold miners, which have been ongoing in the Johannesburg High Court since 2004.
The plaintiffs are victims of silicosis and silico-tuberculosis who come from the Free State, Eastern Cape & Lesotho. They were employed on Anglo’s President Steyn Mine in the Free State from the 1970s. The litigation is at an advanced state and is expected to go to trial in 2012.
The plaintiffs’ attorneys are the Legal Resources Centre (Johannesburg) and Leigh Day & Co (London), who previously represented the Cape PLC and Thor Chemicals victims in their successful UK compensation claims. Leigh Day acts as the LRC’s consultant. From the outset, the case has received funding and support from Legal Aid South Africa. For the past 4 years, the Impact Litigation Unit of Legal Aid South Africa has been actively involved in the management of the case.
Anglo is represented by Webber Wentzel.
A study by Girdler Brown et al, published in the American Journal of Industrial Medicine in 2008 confirmed very high rates of silicosis and TB in miners from Lesotho who had been employed on President Steyn.
According to the authors: “These high rates of lung disease amongst former gold miners are of national concern…These findings and their consistency with previously published reports on the prevalence of respiratory disease in ex miners provide a compelling case for improved statutory surveillance and reporting of silicosis and TB among former gold miners not just for compensation purposes, but also to monitor the effectiveness of control measures aimed at reducing the risk..”
The authors also note that the findings of the study are consistent with those of two previous studies (on miners from Eastern Cape & Botswana).
Last April, one of the plaintiffs, Alpheos Blom, attended Anglo’s AGM in London on the invitation of UK anti-poverty action group, War on Want.
Mr Blom worked underground on the President Steyn mine in the Free State from 1984-2001. He contracted a severe form of silicosis and tuberculosis and has been unable to work since leaving the mine. He informed the Anglo Board and shareholders directors of his plight and that of thousands of other similarly affected gold miners.
One year on, Mr Blom’s health has deteriorated and he is unable to make the journey to London again. In the past 3 months two (out of the 18) of his fellow plaintiffs have died.
Referring to silicosis and tuberculosis, eminent South African medical expert, Professor Tony Davies, has described a “river of disease flowing out of the gold mines”. The mining industry has been well aware for many years of the following:
- at least tens of thousands of former black miners, working unprotected on the dustiest jobs have contracted silicosis.
- the majority of these victims, having been migrant labourers, in particular from the Eastern Cape, Lesotho, Swaziland & Botswana
- because of their silicosis, these victims have a much higher risk of contracting TB, including drug-resistant TB, which is frequently left undiagnosed and treated, causing serious lung damage and death and infection of other family members
- the majority of the victims do not receive the statutory compensation to which they are entitled
- the statutory system is in any event inadequate because (a) it contains no element of compensation for pain and suffering (b) as it is based on earnings, it discriminates against black miners who will receive less compensation than white miners with the same severity of disease..
Regrettably, the response of the industry to the plight of former gold miners, whose health has been sacrificed for the rest of their lives, in the interests of profit, has been woefully lacking.
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