[Bhpbilliton] BHP Protests in S. Africa Lead to 68 Arrests, SAPA Reports

[Andy Whitmore]

  Anyone got any more information on these stories...?


*BHP Protests in S. Africa Lead to 68 Arrests, SAPA Reports*

By Mkhululi Mancotywa, Bloomberg

19 February 2010

Sixty eight people were arrested and 21 injured in protests against BHP 
Billiton Ltd. yesterday in Ogies, a town in the eastern South African 
province of Mpumalanga, the South Press Association said, citing a 
police spokesman.

Among the injured were three police officers who were hit by stones and 
bottles and 18 protesters who were hurt by rubber bullets, the news 
agency said. The protesters were demanding job’s at BHP’s Klipspruit 
coal mine in Ogies.

------------------------------------------------------------------------

*
21 injured, 61 arrested in Ogies protest*

http://www.iol.co.za/index.php?set_id=1&click_id=594&art_id=nw20100218174243252C140008 
<http://www.iol.co.za/index.php?set_id=1&click_id=594&art_id=nw20100218174243252C140008>

18 February 2010

Twenty-one people were injured and 61 were arrested in Ogies, 
Mpumalanga, on Thursday in protests against BHP Billiton - the second 
violent action targeting a mining company in the past two weeks, police 
said.

They included three police officials, who were injured on the shoulder, 
mouth and head when stones and bottles were thrown at them, said Captain 
Leonard Hlathi.

Hlathi said the police had to fire rubber bullets to disperse crowds 
burning tyres and barricading roads with bottles, dustbins and road 
traffic signs.

"Eighteen protesters were bruised from the rubber bullets. We have 
arrested 61 people for public violence," he said, adding that all the 
main roads in the Phola township, in Ogies, were closed.

"They [the protesters] want to draw attention from BHP Billiton. They 
are claiming there were several meetings with BHP Billiton and they are 
claiming BHP Billiton is not employing people from Phola township," said 
Hlathi.

BHP Billiton owns the Klipspruit coal mine in Ogies.

The mine's spokesman Johnny Dladla said 94 percent of the people 
employed by the BHP Billiton's Klipspruit colliery were from the 
Nkangala district.

"Of these, eight percent are from the local Ogies or Phola township," 
said Dladla.

He said BHP Billiton remained open and committed to continue discussions 
with community leaders through the local Community Development Forum.

Last week, schooling was disrupted and the library set alight in the 
Mpumalanga town of Balfour in protests against the local Burnstone gold 
mine, which residents accused of not investing enough in infrastructure 
development.

Co-operative Governance Minister Sicelo Shiceka was visiting the 
Siyathemba township in Balfour on Thursday to check on the situation.

ANC Youth League leader Julius Malema has been in the news repeatedly 
lately for saying he believed mines should be nationalised to fund free 
education, to the ire of Mining Minister Susan Shabangu, who vowed that 
it would not happen in her lifetime. - Sapa

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