Khoemacau to retrench
Ryder Gabathuse | Friday August 4, 2017 15:07
This follows Khoemacau’s announcement on July 31 that due to unforeseen circumstances the copper/silver miner will terminate contracts of some of its workforce as a way of cutting ‘unbearable’ costs.
BMWU general secretary, Mbiganyi Ramokate was in the dark yesterday about the goings on at Khoemacau, but insisted that his office will do everything possible to reach out to the concerned miners.
BMWU was yet to set up a fully-fledged branch at the site, where Ramokate indicated that at some stage, their predecessors at the BMWU held talks with the mine management, but nothing tangible came out of the talks.
“We were in the process of setting up a relationship that will go a long way. If we could get a copy of the letters written to individual miners, we would take it from there,” Ramokate promised yesterday.
Generally, he was responding to Mmegi inquiries on the Khoemacau letters of notice under section 25 (2) of the Employment Act of redundancy written to the miners.
Khoemacau Copper Mining, managing director, John Ferreira wrote to all the miners: “In early 2017 the company commenced with the process of mobilisation for construction of its copper/silver project in the Kalahari copper belt. This process involved the assembly of the project execution team, as well as various advanced engineering and planning activities.”
In a letter sourced from one of the concerned miners, Ferreira announced that the outcome of the activities, specifically external factors, “such as power supply uncertainty around the timing of the transmission like project and environmental permitting delays, have led to a decision to move project pre-construction commencement indicatively into the second half of 2018”.
Ferreira was adamant that during this period of project engineering and design, as well as through the two-year project construction period, there will be limited exploration and care and maintenance work on the company’s project site.
“Thus, the company’s Board has decided to reduce these activities along with related support services, to focus the company’s resources on project development,” Ferreira said noting that since the company is not generating revenue, all expenditure has been funded with external debt or equity from its stakeholders.
The decision to cut on staffing is aimed at reducing expenditure other than in critical areas to safeguard the long-term sustainability of the business.
Ferreira’s letter emphasised the bad news: “We are therefore currently considering terminating contracts of employment for the purpose of reducing the size of the workforce, as contemplated in section 25 of the Act”.
He said the move will likely affect employees across the board and that there is a real likelihood of a sizeable number of the company’s employees being declared redundant and having to be released due to these operational reasons.
Effort to solicit comments from Ferreira and the mine’s country manager, Johannes Tsimako were futile at press time as Ferreira was reportedly out on company business whilst Tsimako’s line rang unanswered.
The BCL Group of Mines, which mined copper/nickel, axed nearly 5,000 employees last October following the closure of both Tati Nickel Mine and BCL.