Mozambique: Over 4,000 miners left South Africa in March, only 1,371 have so far returned

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Mozambique: Over 4,000 miners left South Africa in March, only 1,371 have so far returned

6:36 CAT | 27 Aug 2020

File photo: Lusa

More than 4,000 Mozambican mining workers have left South Africa since the Covid-19 confinement was decreed in March, a spokesman for the South African Minerals Council told Lusa on Thursday.

A spokesman for the South African employers’ organisation, Alan Fine, said that of a total of 4,111 miners, only 1,371 Mozambican miners have so far returned to the gold and platinum mines in South Africa.

The mining and extractive industry in South Africa employs a total of 442,478 miners, of which 20,810 Mozambicans are in gold and platinum mines, the spokesman said.

The Minerals Council of South Africa said that the sector is working with various government ministries on the return to South African mines of some 4,400 mining workers from various countries in the southern region of the continent, including Mozambicans.

The sector has identified 11,482 miners of various nationalities who have left the country due to the Covid-19 pandemic, with about 62% returning to South Africa.

The spokesman also told Lusa that 140 mining workers have died from Covid-19 in South Africa since March. However, Alan Fine said he did not know the nationality of the deaths.

Data from the Minerals Council SA, which represents 90% of South Africa’s mining production, indicates that the mining sector contributed 360.9 billion rands (€18,087 billion) to the country’s gross domestic product (GDP) in 2019.

South Africa registers 13,502 deaths and 615,701 positive cases of Covid-19 infection, according to health authorities.

The mining provinces of Gauteng and Northwest, where the main gold and platinum mines are concentrated, register 33.8% and 4.0% of Covid-19 cases respectively, according to the Ministry of Health.

South Africa, the fifth country with the most cases of the disease worldwide, has conducted more than 3.5 million Covid-19 tests since the outbreak of the new coronavirus in March, reported authorities, which have reported 525,242 recovered from the disease to date.

Source: Lusa