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The National Union of Mineworkers (NUM) has vowed to mobilise thousands of its members from across the country to march to AngloGold Ashanti’s head offices if the company does not rethink its decision to retrench 8 500 workers.
The union, the company and various other industry stakeholders met on Thursday at the department of mineral resources’ offices in Pretoria, where the NUM asked the company to explain its decision.
NUM deputy president Joseph Montisetsi said the union would not hesitate to down tools and march to the AngloGold headquarters if there was no change in the mindset of the company.
Montisetsi, who also attended the meeting, said that the company’s explanation that the retrenchments were because the two mines were being restructured, were uneconomical to mine and there wasn’t enough gold reserves to sustain them was not true.
“AngloGold’s previous mines that were dumped for the same reasons and taken over by other companies are now operating. So we want independent geological research to be done,” he said, further accusing the company of paying its executives exorbitant salaries.
He also said the company had taken a lot of money out of the country to fund its operations in South America, Australia, Ghana and Guinea.
AngloGold spokesperson Chris Nthite said the company had decided not to comment on the matter yet.
