In an endeavor to raise awareness and advocate for the rights of miners, Botswana Labour Migrants Association (BoLAMA) will hold mass demonstrations with ex-miners groupings in the Western Cape at the upcoming 11th Alternative Mining Indaba (AMI), has revealed the association.
The Association this past week revealed in a statement that, it shall send a three member delegation AMI in Cape Town from the 3rd -5th February 2020. This year’s convening will be held under the theme “Environmentally and economically sustainable mineral economies in an era of climate change catastrophe”.
Amongst other planned activities by BoLAMA at the AMI are meetings with representatives from the World Economic Forum, media briefings with country chapters of the Justice for Miners Campaign and attending a session hosted by WEF, IGF and ICMM on “Future of Work in Mining”.
Kitso Phiri, Coordinator for BoLAMA mentioned that it was important for BoLAMA to attend the event so that they can benchmark and build new relations that will improve their ability to advocate for the rights of miners. He further stated that this will be an opportune platform to launch the #JusticeForMiners Campaign that will see the screening of the “Dying for Gold” documentary, from which BoLAMA will use its convening power to bring together high level stakeholders to discuss modalities of ensuring just administration of the Tshiamiso Trust and speedy compensation and accountability among South African institutions responsible for dispensing mineworkers compensations.
Established in 2010 – the platform brings together communities affected by mining, faith-based organisations (FBOs), civil society organisations (CSO), activist scholars, researchers and funders concerned with the social injustices in the extractive sector.
It also provides space for capacity-building and also allows African mining communities to voice their concerns about the accumulation strategy of corporate capitalism which convenes annually under the umbrella of AMI.
Multi-national corporations generate huge profits out of mining operations while communities continue to suffer due to high levels of poverty. While the AMI has achieved progress with regards to the primary goal of amplifying the voices of mining affected communities including advocacy on policy and legislative reforms, still, more advocacy work is required to address environmental issues and to combat climate change and its impacts.
