Poor as church mice thanks to two fat cats

It has been more than three years since Michak Htlanga saw Khulubuse Zuma arrive at Grootvlei mine. Zuma had just become the mine's new owner and Htlanga was one of its soon-to-be-destitute workers.

Since then, Htlanga has struggled to make ends meet - and Zuma has been living in luxury.

Htlanga recalls in some detail the day that Zuma, who had bought the mine with the help of politically connected partners, arrived to inspect his new acquisition in Springs on Gauteng's East Rand. The new owner did not even get out of the black Honda Civic that brought him there.

"I think he was too fat or too lazy to get out of the car," said Htlanga.

A fitter by trade, Htlanga is one of many ex-miners who have yet to receive a cent of the money owed to them by Zuma's Aurora Empowerment Systems, which went bust.

This Christmas was like all the others since Aurora drove the mine into the ground. Former employees are still living there, but they survive on sporadic hand-outs. They appear to have long since given up any hope of getting the salaries owed to them.

Charities in the area can no longer provide food. Some say it has been more than a year since they received any donations.

Aurora was run by Khulubuse, a nephew of President Jacob Zuma, and Zondwa Mandela, a grandson of the late Nelson Mandela. They took over the Grootvlei operations from the liquidated Pamodzi in 2009.

Aurora has been accused of destroying infrastructure at the mine, resulting in the loss of more than 5000 jobs.

The cost to the miners has not been just financial. Families have broken up and some miners committed suicide. One former employee said: "I heard that at least 70 people who used to work here have killed themselves in the past three years. I personally knew eight of them."

Many former miners have moved from the dilapidated buildings on the Grootvlei site, finding refuge in the nearby Payneville settlement.

Htlanga and men who have found jobs at mines in the area stay in the few buildings that have not yet been bulldozed.

"You can forget about Christmas. Every day is a struggle here," he said. "There is no electricity and the water was also cut. We take wheelbarrows to the nearest tap about a kilometre from here to get water. It's tough."

Police are a constant threat to the Grootvlei people, some of whom admit to mining illegally. On any given day, three police cars will arrive. People said the police came to take whatever money they had on them.

George Basing had no money this Christmas to visit his two children, who live with his sister in his home town, Welkom.

"Every day begins thinking about the next thing I will do to get something for the stomach. Whenever I get anything like R100 from doing odd jobs for the nearby Indian suburbs, I keep some for myself and send the rest home and look ahead for the challenges of the next day," said Basing.

Richard Dube left his five children and wife in Swaziland to take up a job at Grootvlei. He, too, is now destitute.

"My children have been saying they miss me when I call. I don't know what to say to them because my passport has expired and I don't have a penny to renew it.

"When I walk around, I avoid public places because I could be arrested," Dube said.

Johan Mazuza, a Mozambican national, said his wife left him because he could not look after the family.

Aurora took over seven operational shafts at Grootvlei mine and six operational shafts at Orkney in 2009. When the company was removed by the liquidators in April 2011, none of the shafts was operational. Most of the water pumps have been stripped - leaving the area at risk of rising acid mine water.

"Most of the pumps that were removed from the pump station were ... sold," said Ayanda Mlingana, secretary of the Grootvlei Residential Committee.

Mlingana, who is also a local committee chairman of the National Union of Mineworkers in Grootvlei, said he was at a loss to understand how the Department of Mineral Resources could have awarded a certificate to people to operate a mine when they had no experience.

"When we were called to a meeting in Sandton and informed that the likes of the Zumas and Mandelas were going to take over the mine, we were over the moon," he said.

"It was like the government was taking over and we thought these are the people who will understand our plight as black people. I regret that today."

Mlingana and Simon Nohaya think the Aurora bosses never wanted the mine to succeed.

"When they arrived, they never bought any mining equipment and we began to smell a rat when they did not pay us for two consecutive months.

"Before we could open our eyes, they had started stripping the mine," he said.