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Thousands of Anglo-American Platinum mine workers have been striking for three weeks, for what they were called in for disciplinary hearings. But not all of them appeared there, and in the result they happened to be just fired. As Anglo-American Platinum which is South African mining giant informed on Friday, the company had fired about 12,000 striking workers who declined to attend disciplinary hearings arranged by the employer. Anglo-American Platinum said in a statement that "Despite the company's repeated calls for employees to return to work, we have continued to experience attendance levels of less than 20%. Currently four of the company's mining operations in the Rustenburg area have insufficient staff to operate and only essential services are being carried out at those mines." Such move of firing was highly criticized by the public, including Ronald Lamola, a deputy president of the ruling African National Congress (ANC) Youth League, who considers that the parties could definitely have reached some alternative solution. As he said concerning the actions of the employing side, "What they have done is extremely unreasonable and cannot be accepted." Ronald Lamola also stressed that many more than 12,000 people, which is just an enormous number itself, are dependent on those incomes. He also told about the fact that the organization had been trying to assist workers. And African National Congress (ANC) Youth League still believes that a solution can be reached somehow. The workers are just devastated, according the words of Lamola. The current situation at mining operations in South Africa is just tension so much. The strike turned deadly the whole operation process at the Lonmin-owned Marikana platinum mine. And it isn’t the first incident. As it is well-remembered police opened fire on strikers during the demonstration that happened there in August. In the result 34 workers were killed. That happened days before other 10 people, including two police officers, died in incidents which occurred in the Marikana area. The Anglo-American Platinum mine also has happened to become the site of violence on Thursday. According the words of police spokesman Brig. Thulani Ngubane, who tried to explain the situation, South African police clashed with around 100 or 150 protesters who were gathering at a mountain near the mine. Striking miners, strike sympathizers and local residents were among the protesters, as Brig. Thulani Ngubane notified. Suck kind of gatherings are considered to be illegal, and police are authorized to use force, which happened this time again. Water cannons, tear gas and rubber bullets were applied against the striking people after the crowd refused to disperse. Thandi Modise, who is North West Provincial Government Premier, expressed concern about the recent violence and called for the necessity of urgent interventions. "We are extremely worried that violence is once again rearing its ugly head and spilling over to local businesses and people who are not party to the labor dispute. Wage negotiations should not be characterized by violence. The price that we all paid in Marikana was too costly. Sanity has to prevail for an urgent solution to be found to avert further violent confrontations that might have dire repercussions for the mining sector and the economy," he said afterwards sad events.
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