Park guide Wiseman Dlamini will talk for hours about the 42 000 year old Ngwenya mine, but point to the fresh-tilled earth and pipe spilling iron-red water into the Hawane Dam the water source for Swaziland's capital, Mbabane or ask him about the Indian company mining this Swazi-South African international nature reserve and he is quiet. As is almost everyone in Swaziland.
Since October 2011 Salgaocar has been mining the Malolotja Nature Reserve and shipping cheap, low grade iron ore across the world. By allowing it, Swaziland has lost a potential world heritage site, fired its own conservation board and put Mbabane's supply of drinking water at risk, say environmental experts.
The impact of mining on the environment is an old story, but what is happening in Swaziland is particularly dramatic. A high school teacher is the author of the environmental impact assessment; Salgaocar, according to the Times of Swaziland, handed out iPads to ministers; there is no apparent plan to prevent iron-rich waste water from entering local streams and rivers.
The protocol violations, disregard for local communities, fear of speaking out and blatant corruption is emblematic of modern Swaziland and the increasingly despotic rule of King Mswati III, who owns on behalf of the country 60% of the nation's land.
Ngwenya mine sits in the mountainous and picturesque Malolotja Nature Reserve along Swaziland's northwestern border with South Africa. It is the last unspoiled mountain wilderness left in Swaziland. The reserve extends over an area of 18000 hectares, making it the largest proclaimed protected area in the kingdom.
After Anglo American mined an estimated 20 million tonnes of high grade iron ore from Ngwenya during the 1960s and 1970s, the region became a conservation area. In 2004 Swaziland and South Africa combined Malolotja and the Songimvelo Nature Reserve into a single transfrontier conservation area. Unesco began supporting its application to become a world heritage site. A cluster of high-end shops sprang up next to the Ngwenya Glass factory.
But Anglo American left behind more than 32 million tonnes of ore.
On June 20 2011, Salgaocar called an environmental scoping meeting to talk to local stakeholders about the environmental issues surrounding reprocessing the "overburden" and "waste dumps", as Salgaocar reportedly called them at the meeting. Two weeks later, Swaziland signed a letter of commitment with Salgaocar and, 13 days after that, the environmental impact assessment was published.
Source - mg.co.za
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