Farmers fear for their lives and livelihoods in toxic area

If she doesn’t move, Susanna Smit could be dead in three months.  That’s the price the 65 year old could pay for living much of her life in the shadow of one of the deepest underground gold mines in the world.

“My doctor told me my lungs look like a man who has worked underground in the mines for 30 years”, says the out-of breath Smit of the progressive lung disease that first started shrinking her lungs five years ago.  “But I’ve never worked on a mine.  I’ve never smoked a day in my life and neither has my husband.”

She struggles to her feet in her neat farmhouse which lies half a kilometer from South Deep mine, operated by Gold Fields, in Westonaria, south west of Johannesburg.

Smit holds two X-rays in her hands.  One shows her shriveled lungs, the other a healthier set of lungs – but not hers.  “My doctor gave me this person’s X-ray to compare my lungs with.   You can see this person’s are sponge, but mine are hard and full of spiderwebs.”

She blames her illness on the clouds of toxic dust carried from the towering mine dumps by the merest whisper of wind into her house.

“It must be the dust I breathe in all the time because if I visit my children in the Free State, I feel better within two days and have more energy.  As soon as I come back, I’m sick again.”

Suddenly, her conversation is interrupted by a hoarse coughing fit that seizes her body and brings tears to her eyes.

“Every day I deteriorate.  I can’t breathe.  I’m tired all the time.  I was a busy lady before, I was healthy.  I milked the cows for my husband.

“Now I’m on cortisone and antibiotics for the rest of my bloody life.  The doctor told me if I don’t leave here in three months, I will be dead.”

Local doctors, reveals her husband, Martin, didn’t want to link his wife’s illness to the dust fallout.

“We’ve been to several doctors – the doctors are scared of the mines and don’t want to take them on.  Among the farmers, nobody has money to take the mines on and they know it.”

But the couple’s new doctor, based in Krugersdorp, writes that Smit’s clinical picture is “definitely aggravated by the nearby mine dump and the secondary dust cloud” surrounding the smallholding where she lives.

“X-rays can’t lie”, interjects Martin, a dairy farmer.  “Everyone who lives around here is so sick.  How come are the cancer rates so high?  I don’t think the mines know how they’ve destroyed our lives.”

He points to the clouds of whit dust filling the sky , as his For Sale sign flutters forlornly nearby.

“Look at how the dust hangs – it’s everywhere.  But the mine says this isn’t their dust and that it comes from Randfontein.

“Even when the wind is not blowing, there’s still dust coming from the mine dumps”.

Bottled water is stacked in the kitchen.  Like their neighbours, they no longer trust the water coming from their borehole.

“We’ve had lots of problems with our animals such as abortions and deformities.  But we can’t afford to buy them bottled water too and they drink the borehole water.”

Petrus and Lillian Pienaar moved to the area three years ago to be closer to the Smits – their lifelong friends.  Their house has been on the market for more than half of that time.

“No one wants to buy here”, says Lillian.  “They see the mine dumps and they’re not interested.”

The Pienaars are suspicious of the mine’s analysis of their borehole, choosing instead to fork out the money from their diminishing pension for independent water tests by the University of Cape Town.  These recommend the couple don’t drink this water because it shows signs of contamination.

The Smits and Pienaars tell how they have to replace their geyser elements every three to six months because the acidic mine water corrodes them.

Last week, they were among a group of local framers that gathered at their local library, citing the alleged impacts of mining on their health, their livestock and the agricultural potential of their increasingly tainted land.

Some have now vowed to take on the mines.

In their arsenal is Mariette Liefferink, the chief executive of the Federation for a Sustainable Environment, an outspoken environmentalist, who has drawn Parliament’s attention to the poisonous legacy of mining of the Witwatersrand goldfields over the past century.

Within the heavily mined Wonderfonteinspruit catchment area, flowing between Randfontein and Potchefstroom, heavy metals and radioactive pollutants persist.

Several studies, commissioned both by the mines and the government, have shown the Leeuwspruit, which runs through Westonaria to the Vaal, is contaminated.

Liefferink repeates her call for an epidemiological study to quantify the health risks of mining in the Witwatersrand, but that is a call likely to go unanswered.

As the region’s mines have closed or been abandoned, they have left a toxic tide of acidic – and potentially radioactive – mine water to rise to the surface, contaminating waterways.

In Westonaria and its surrounds, a similar dirty picture unfolds.  “There is significant toxic and radioactive dust fallout from the South Deep Mine,” says Liefferink.  “They built the tailings dam on the fountains, you can imagine the impact on the groundwater.

“The anecdotal evidence of cancers in the Leeuwspruit area is overwhelming.  But the burden I s now on affected communities to prove there is a link with the mining waste, and, of course, it’s impossible.

“Those people that buy property where there are already existing tailings dams make an informed choice.  But people who have lived there for many years had the mines encroach upon them”.

And farmers here have a new battle on their hands – two mega mine tailings facilities, or “superdumps” proposed by Rand Uranium and Gold Fields in their vicinity, which would result in the deposit of one billion tons of uraniferous tailings.

The firms stress these facilities, if approved, will employ techniques to stop groundwater and dust pollution but residents like Susan Esterhuizen are angry at the prospect.

She lives down the road from Smit, and like her, she suffers from progressive lung disease.
At night I can’t breathe and I think it’s the dust that is making me sick.  Our houses are covered in dust.  The doctors keep telling me to stop smoking but I never have.

“A lot of the people around here have cancer and are sick.  I want us all to come together and fight the pollution.  But I would never want to leave my farm because we love our farm.”

Another growing concern is the potential contamination of crops that are then sold on to consumers, says Liefferink.

“There are large tracts of orchards in this area that bear fruit that is either sold to market or exported.

“The farmers claim the dust from the tailings dams deposit on their fruit and this is of concern.”

Esterhuizen’s neighbour, Neels van Wyk, who runs the family farm, says that on windy days, a blanket of dust from the mine dumps obscures the sky and “you can’t see in front of you.”

“That dust sits on our peaches and vegetables.  People come from all over for our peaches including Natal.  We sell to hawkers that sell to Soweto and Sebokeng.

“But the peaches don’t grow like they should anymore.  The dust kills the peaches.  We sell spinach and pumpkins too and don’t know if that’s contaminated.  We don’t know if our water is contaminated either.”

A year ago, his mother Willa, 69 contracted leukaemia, which she believes is mining related.  “The mines can’t make what they’ve done right”, she says.  “All our land is already so contaminated.”

Her son sees hope in engagement with companies like Gold Fields.

“We must try speaking to the mines.  They don’t know yet about our concerns about the water and dust pollution.”

But more and more, he is also worried by what he encounters on his farm.”

He indicates several trees on his property on which tumour-like growths protrude like boils, the mummified corpse of a mouse he discovered in the house, its spine deformed, and he points out a rooster with a deformed spine.

“I was also born with a deformed spine.  I don’t know if these things are because of mining.

“Everywhere the water goes it must be contaminated.”

A 2007 report commissioned by Gold Fields, conducted by African Environmental Development, showed evidence of mining contamination on the nearby farm of Piet Rheeder.  It highlighted how radioactive mining waste had accumulated in the Leeuwspruit catchment upstream of his farm.  His wife died from cancer of the bowel.

“Gold Fields have done tests in his dam and found it to be highly contaminated with uranium.  Its sediment is so contaminated it can be profitably mined,” says Liefferink.

“His pigs aborted and his chickens had livers the size of a hand.  His crops did not wish to grow.”

Sven Lunsche, Gold Fields spokesman, says while mining clearly does have an impact on water quality, it only acquired the mine in 2007, inheriting “significant environmental legacy issues”.

“We have focused on getting the environmental performance to the level at which our other mines operates – namely within regulated limits as determined by our previous water permits and current water use licences.

“Our policy is to investigate all allegations to determine whether our discharges cause harm, but we have, as yet, not come across evidence that South Deep is solely responsible for emissions that have damaged the health of humans or animals in the area”.

Liefferink says mining companies in the area have already bought out large tracts of farming land.

Lunsche says it has engaged with many farmers in the area “solely to find out what the perceptions are within the community” and it is not on a crusade to buy farms.

“Buying farms in cases where there is evidence of pollution is not regarded as being a desirable solution as we prefer to solve the issues and to continue supporting the farming community.”

But Noel van Nieuwenhuizen and his wife Jenny maintain the community won’t stand for more pollution and will fight the propse super dumps – or they want to be bought out.

Over 4 000 of their peach trees have died in recent years, as their tomato and chilli plantations have withered away.  They blame their borehole water, which is so corrosive it eats through their water pipes.  “In the long run they will murder my family for the sake of money”, says Van Niewenhuizen.

“Must we prove this pollution with autopsies on our family?”

Jenny adds:  “Our sheep don’t even carry full term.  Some are deformed and premature.”

Nearby horse breeder Rene Laubscher, tells of how he recently lost his wife to cancer.  His daughter is in remission from Hodgkins Lymphoma.

“I don’t know what’s in the water.  But these things don’t kill you overnight, it accumulates.  I still maintain we must get together and test the water before the super dumps come.”

A few kilometers away, Smit tells how she often thinks of her neighbour who also had lung disease.  “The mine bought his place and nine months later he died.

“I can’t sit around waiting to die like Mr. Erasmus.”

On Monday, 27^th September the Environment and Conservation Association convened a group of concerned community leaders, who met in Boksburg and constituted a new organization, called Clean Water Foundation. C.W.F a national, independently constituted organisation whose aim it is to provide a comprehensive service in respect of responding to the escalating national water crisis in South Africa.

C.W.F. aims to focus their efforts on water justice and providing healthy water from source for present and future generations.

It will ensure that it offers an anonymous toll-free contact number for whistle-blowers and will be responsive to any complaints from civil and government sources regarding the intentional, negligent and/or willful destruction of South Africa’s water resources .

C.W.F. welcomes all like-minded organizations to strengthen our position nationally by joining forces with them.

Office bearers on the executive of this new Foundation are Nicole Barlow (ECA – Environment & Conservation Association), Chair person, Carin Smit (SANNC – Synapse Africa Neuro-Nutritional Clinic) Vice-Chair, Dr. Pieter van Eeden (ECA) and Johan Botha (NRA – National Ratepayers Association), as well as Irene Main (SAVE – Save the Vaal Environment) (portfolio – international liaison).

In the light of the ever increasing national water crisis, SANNC wishes to bring the following article, which appeared in INet Bridge, Sapa, Updated: 2010/09/29 - http://news.za.msn.com/article.aspx?cp-documentid=154799782

“By 2015, 80 percent of South Africa’s fresh water resources will be so badly polluted that no process of purification available in the country will be able to make it fit for consumption.”

The Environment and Conservation Association said in a statement on Tuesday that it was estimated that in five years, almost 80 percent of the country’s fresh water resources would be so badly polluted that no process of purification available in the country would be able to clean it sufficiently to make it fit for human or animal consumption.

“If we do not find a completely new source of water altogether in about two years, most of Gauteng will be without safe health drinking water.”

The impending disaster that would be created by acid mine drainage as well as sewerage and industrial pollution had on many occasions been brought to the attention of the government, however with no positive results, the association said.

The association would embark on a massive water monitoring project where it would roll out water testing and monitoring in the six major water catchments in Gauteng and Limpopo, to produce independent and accurate results of exactly how bad the country’s water was.

Those results would be released to the public and the media, both locally and internationally.

“We will need approximately R 1 million for this project. It is time that big business, especially those that rely on water for the production of their products like Coca Cola, SAB Miller, Windhoek Beer, all soft drink manufacturers and food producers, get involved and make a substantial contribution towards organisations like ours so we can save South Africa’s water.”

Water preservation and conservation was not just an environmental issue, but an economic issue.

“Almost 56 percent of the products we consume rely directly on the supply of clean healthy water, and if this water is not available, those products cannot be produced.”

“Water affects every single part of our daily lives and without it we cannot survive. We cannot eat and we will be left in a country made barren by pollution.”

Radioactivity sign at Acid Mine Drainage site on West-Rand

Over the past 6 years I have seen patients in several countries who have been tested for heavy metal toxicity.  A recent study in Punjab, India, revealed excessively high levels of uranium and other toxic metals in children in the Baba Farid Centre for Special Children, in Faridkot, Punjab.  Except for the 100+ children in Punjab whose hair analyses exceeded reference ranges for hair, another 37 patients in 5 other countries yielded test results that exceeded the reference ranges for uranium, for the respective tests. To date the source of the uranium is yet to be determined, but there are strong pointers to the thermal power plants, which produce high amounts of fly-ash, causing acid water to leech into the aquifer, disrupting the earth’s crust in rock formations in the soil of Punjab.

Outside India, the country with the next highest number of individuals exceeding the references ranges for uranium in hair, baseline urine samples and post-DMSA chelation samples was South Africa – showing past and chronic exposure. I counted 17 patients in South Africa with excessive uranium levels, 6 of whom have a diagnosis of autism (i.e. 35%). 4 Neuro-typical adults also had excessive uranium – all four had significant health challenges. 4 Children with severe learning disabilities and 3 with neurological damage (blind, oral apraxia, brain injury due to hypoxia) also had excessive uranium levels.  The source of the high uranium in South Africa is not hard to determine – South Africa has a legacy of unregulated mining dating back 120 years, resulting in high levels of acid mine drainage and radionuclides which are finding their way into the environment at an alarming rate.

In Ireland 6 patients showed excessive uranium – of these 6 individuals, 3 have a diagnosis of autism (50%, one with significant Learning disabilities and 2 are neuro-typical adults with health challenges.  My recent visit to Ireland confronted me with the shocking discovery that Europe’s largest zinc mine can be found in the Midlands of the Republic, Lisheen, and not more than 7 kilometers from Lisheen, is the lead mine of Galmoy.  Both of these mines have disturbed the earth’s crust and leech uranium rich water into the aquifer.  Large parts of  Ireland are plagued with high levels of Radon (Radon is a radioactive gas, the progeny of uranium) exceeding the safety limit by more than 20% (Radiological Protection Unit of Ireland, 2002).

Ireland - Radon map

Map Legend

Estimated percentage of homes above the Reference Level

> 20%  10% – 20%  5% – 10%  1% – 5%  < 1%

Bahrain, in the Persian Gulf, had 9 patients which excessive uranium levels. 7 of these have a diagnosis of autism (77%), 2 are neuro-typical adults with health challenges and one is both autistic and has an inborn error of metabolism (genetic abnormality).

In Botswana 2 patients had excessive levels of uranium – one an LD child and one a neuro-typical adult.

In South Korea 3 patients from one family in Daejeon tested high in uranium – one neuro-typical teenager, one neuro-typical adult and one teenager with psychiatric challenges due to Tamiflu medication during a bout of swine flu.

Excessive uranium was most commonly found in mineral hair test results (27 tests  – 55% – some patients were tested repeatedly over several years). The Post DMSA chelation urine test yielded the next highest excessive uranium results (13/49) and the baseline urine samples least often showed excessive uranium (9/49).

It would seem, from my experience with these 137 patients in 6 countries, that hair mineral tests are the most valuable measure to detect past and chronic exposure to excessive uranium. Though DMSA didn’t effectively chelate barium, cadmium, manganese or uranium in the Indian study, it chelated uranium on 13 of the 49 tests done across the population in South Africa, Ireland, Bahrain, Botswana and South Korea (26.5%).

Along with uranium, aluminium, antimony, arsenic, barium, beryllium, bismuth, cesium, mercury, palladium, platinum, nickel, lead, silver, thallium, tin, titanium, tungsten and zirconium were successfully chelated by means of DMSA. Arsenic, Lead, Mercury, Nickel and Palladium were by far the most successfully chelated toxic metals by means of DMSA across all 47 tests.

The mutagenic effects of uranium and its progeny are firmly documented in scientific literature.

Note from the editor of New Solutions: The Drawing Board: In the spirit of international solidarity, The Drawing Board has begun featuring articles from activists, researchers, and workers from around the world. It is our belief that we cannot effectively fight for social, economic and environmental justice in isolation, but instead must learn from and support one another. The parallels between Mexican workers’ grievances and environmental catastrophes in Ethiopia are often striking, but more often forgotten. Through our monthly posts, therefore, TDB will highlight events taking place around in the world, and advocate for greater connectedness between worker and environmental rights movements in the global north and global south. Graduate student Andrea Zeelie kicks off this effort by writing about the severity of acid mine drainage in South Africa.

Acid mine outrage: How South African communities are affected by government and industry neglect

By Andrea Zeelie

Acid mine drainage (AMD) refers to the mixing of water with toxic chemicals such as those present in heavy metals, sulphates, and radioactive uranium, which leak from abandoned mine sites into dolomitic areas underground. The contaminated water penetrates ground water sources, which in turn leach into surface water sources. This can degrade water quality to the point that it is unfit for human and animal consumption or crop irrigation. Ingestion of this toxic acid water is related to increased health risks, such as cancers.

Such pollution represents arguably the most mismanaged environmental disaster South Africa has ever witnessed. Scientists and environmentalists have battled for action since 1996, when they first became aware of potential damage. The eastern, central, and west basins of the Witswatersrand are polluted, immediately affecting residents living in half-a-dozen surrounding communities.

Government action with regards to this disaster has been varied, lethargic and confusing: any response involves five departments, each with divergent interests. In an ideal world, industry would pay to clean up the devastating amount of AMD within South Africa, under government oversight. However, extreme government inaction has led to little payments and even less accountability.

Severely delayed action undoubtedly lies in the relationship between government and the mining industry. South African mines were previously operated by a cohort known as the Big Six, which included Anglo American/De Beers; Gencor/Billiton; Gold Fields; JCI; Anglovaal; and Rand Mines. Together, they controlled more than half of the country’s economy. Their dominance waned, however, when former president Thabo Mbeki came to power: the focused shifted towards black economic empowerment, or BEE, ushering in a new wave of players comfortably connected to both the business and political elite. This second cohort could have imposed much-needed worker and environmental protections, neutralizing errors caused by their predecessors. Instead, they used their political connectedness to amass personal wealth; legitimate expectations from the country’s electorate concerning accountability, transparency and governance failed to materialize.

A third cohort followed, with the country’s current mining elite politically allied to the Jacob Zuma administration. One need only look to the pedigree of some of the country’s most prominent mining directors to become suspicious of an all-too-comfortable link: Aurora Gold, for example, is owned and operated by Zondwa Mandela, Nelson Mandela’s grandson, and Khulubuse Zuma, President Zuma’s cousin. Both were recently charged for failure to treat contaminated water for months, as management had failed to supply the necessary chemicals. The charge only occurred, however, following a barrage of bad press surrounding unpaid salaries and the death of three mineworkers. While the Water Affairs Minister Buyelwa Sonjica informed the National Assembly on 19 May 2010 that prosecutions of the two directors could go ahead, skepticism remains on whether government will ultimately prosecute “family”.

Throughout the Mbeki and Zuma administrations, the lines between global mining consortiums, government, and black business have become increasingly blurred. Where acid mine drainage is concerned, governing documents such as the National Water Act, the Mine and Safety Act, the National Environmental Management Act, and the Constitution of the Republic of South Africa are being chronically undermined by industry’s ties to government. As a result of the country’s post-democracy neo-liberal economic policies, continued dependence on natural resource extraction, and little distinction between the regulators and the regulated, the rights of South Africans and of the environment have become secondary to that of government officials’ prominence and payrolls.

As it stands, only short terms solutions to acid mine drainage – if any at all – have been implemented. A Remediation Action Plan of the Wonderfonteinspruit Catchment Area was constructed by the government, mining companies, and civil society organisations. Since being published in the beginning of 2009, however, no remedial action has been seen.

A long-term solution is costly, with no one willing to accept the price tag. The ‘polluter pays’ principles applies, but with high turnover in mining management, the original offenders are often no longer present, making culpability difficult. Remediation therefore becomes the government’s problem. Given that the government refuses to accept ultimate responsibility, action is deferred, with responsibility and consequences being placed on citizens.

However, activists and advocates are hopeful that strides may have finally been made, 14 years after the battle for action and accountability began. Earlier this month, criminal charges were laid against three cabinet ministers for their failure to act upon the continued pollution of the natural environment. The Agricultural Union of South Africa contends that by failing to address the severity of AMD, the ministers have failed to comply with the National Water Act. While Water Affairs Minister Sonjica did earmark R7 million ($887,000) for cleanup efforts, this is insufficient to treat contaminated water for even one month. The money has also yet to materialize.

What is required now is the continued exposure of the environmental damage, and prominent shaming of violators in the press and in public forums such as parliament, to galvanize the mines and government into action. Custodian organizations like the Agricultural Union of South Africa and the Federation for Environmental Sustainability must increasingly hold the government accountable, on behalf of all citizens.

Andrea Zeelie is pursuing her Masters in Public Health in Health Economics at the University of Cape Town. The focus of her dissertation is the political economy of acid mine drainage in South Africa.

The extreme variations in pH, along with the high toxic metal content, along with the high volume of sulphates in the water (upward of 2500 ppm) makes for a river of death, which will affect vegetation, aquatic life, bird-life, animal life (especially in the Krugersdorp Game Reserve, as it is hardest and first hit!) and downstream it will affect farmers and low-income communities, who rely on the water for everyday living.

This is an appeal for community groups to mobilize and meet and demand that government – local and national – provide compensation and action plans which won’t just stabilize the acid mine drainage, but also address the current ecological disaster and immanent loss of animal life, vegetation and its impact on poorer communities and farmers who make a living out of crops irrigated by this acid contaminated water!

Related Links

• Acid mine drainage: What is it?
• City faces acid deluge