Marikana - Democratic Alliance leader Mmusi Maimane on Monday visited Marikana and delivered an impassioned plea for compensation for the families of the victims of the 2012 police shooting that claimed 34 lives.
Maimane said 21 years after the advent for democracy South Africans still lived in poverty.
“We have the right to vote but, many South Africans face poverty, many South Africans come here to find job opportunities and found themselves in place where their lives are not improving. What South Africans who were here, were fighting for, was to advance their lives.
“I do not speak about the miners only, I also include the security guards and policemen who were killed.,” he said standing at the foot of a koppie in Nkaneng informal settlement.
A wildcat strike in which Lonmin workers demanded a salary of R12 500 a month turned to tragedy in August 2012 when he police opened fire on them. Ten people including two policemen and two Lonmin security guards were killed a week earlier.
“What happened here was a human disaster, it was not a natural disaster…We give guns to the police who decided to mow down the people,” said Maimane.
He said former police Minister Nathi Mthethwa should have taken responsibility and resigned.
Maimane was in Marikana to explained to the affected families what steps the DA was proposing to bring some relief to them, nearly three years after the event.
The party will propopose that Parliament adopt a bill to ensure financial compensation for the families of those killed during the wage strike at Lonmin.
Maimane said the Marikana Victims Compensation Special Appropriation Bill would be presented to Finance Minister Nhlanhla Nene when Parliament reconvenes in August.
“The DA believes the dependents of the victims killed in Marikana in 2012 deserves financial compensation. The families suffered loss of income and hardship… this is a significant tragedy for our democracy and should be treated as such.”
The DA wanted Lonmin and the government to contribute towards a compensation fund.
Maria Tsotseli, 45, the widow of Lonmin security guard Frans Mabalane, said the compensation would enable her 11-year-old daughter Karabo to have a better future.
“She was eight-old-years when her father was killed. I am not working, with that compensation my daughter will have a better future.”
Tsotseli said the Marikana Commission report released on Thursday, did not speak to her plight.
“It does not give a solution. The report is silent on what must be done for us affected people. I still have many questions. The report did not touch issues relevant to me. “
Mabalane and his colleague Hassan Fundi were killed on August 12, 2012. In that week, eight other people, including two policemen and mineworkers were killed as tensions at the mine escalated.
Tsotseli said her 26-year-old son had taken up a job offered by Lonmin for all families that lost a bread winner, but he was still earning less that R9000 and the money was not enough to pay for the household’s needs.
“We are suffering, the money is not enough and it seems people have forgetten about us. I cannot access the money from the trust fund because I struggle to get an unabridged birth certificate for her. It has been three years now.”
She said it was too costly for her to go to the department of home affairs in Brits. A one-way taxi trip from Marikana West to Brits cost R50.
“It means I spend R100 just to go to home affairs and still the certificate is not issued.”
President Jacob Zuma released the findings of the Farlam commission of inquiry on Thursday.
The commission found that Lonmin did not do its best to resolve disputes that arose between itself and its workers. It also found that the Association of Mineworkers and Construction Union (Amcu) and its rival, the National Union of Mineworkers (NUM), did not exercise effective control over their members.
The commission called for an overhaul in public order policing and indicated that most of the officers were inadequately trained in crowd control. It recommended an inquiry into national police commissioner General Riah Phiyega’s fitness to hold office.
Maimane said there was no need to probe whether the police commissioner was fit to hold office, as the answer to that was clear to his mind.
“She is not fit from the first day she was appointed.”
ANA