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Namibia: Skorpion Zinc Turns to Court to Deal With Strike
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The Namibian (Windhoek)
19 May 2008
Posted to the web 19 May 2008
Werner Menges
THE owners of the strike-hit Skorpion Zinc Mine near Rosh Pinah turned to the High Court on Friday in an effort to stop striking workers from interfering with the continuing activities of the mine.
An urgent application by the company owning the mine, Namzinc (Pty) Ltd, against the Mineworkers' Union of Namibia (MUN), MUN General Secretary Joseph Hengari and five employees of Skorpion Zinc Mine who are members of the MUN's branch executive committee at the mine, was heard by Judge President Petrus Damaseb on Friday afternoon.
The hearing ended with the Judge President issuing an order directing the MUN and its members employed by Skorpion Zinc Mine not to interfere with or obstruct the normal functioning of the mine's business, not to intimidate, harass or interfere with any mine employee or people connected to the mine's business, and not to prevent these people from entering or leaving the mine's premises.
After wage negotiations ended in a deadlock, workers at Skorpion Zinc Mine went on strike on May 10.
With strikers picketing outside the main entrance to the mine, contractors doing work for the mine have been denied access to the mine premises, the mine's human resources manager, Mathys Loubser, informed the court in an affidavit setting out the grounds for the urgent application.
After the strikers allowed some contractors onto the premises on Monday last week, the MUN again took a position that the contractors could not leave the premises, Loubser stated.
The MUN also took a view that only night-shift contractors were to be allowed onto the premises, with day-shift contractors again barred from the mine, according to Loubser.
He informed the court that contractors are involved in carrying out essential maintenance work at the mine, and that if they are not allowed to carry out this work, it could have catastrophic results for the mine and the surrounding environment.
Skorpion Zinc Mine is using "a highly sophisticated and unique" chemical process to extract zinc from the ore that it mines some 25 kilometres north of Rosh Pinah, Loubser stated.
The process is "a world first at this scale", according to Loubser, and "is also a highly sensitive process that must operate on a 24-hour basis".
"Should the process stop - such as where the power is switched off at the circuit - then there is a significant danger that there could be a build-up of hydrogen which is flammable and can result in an explosion in the plant," Loubser stated.
The industrial-grade sulphuric acid used to process the zinc ore is produced in an acid plant at the mine, the court was informed.
This process of producing acid cannot be stopped except under controlled conditions, in order to avoid emissions of toxic sulphur dioxide and sulphur trioxide into the environment, Loubser stated.
Should the mine's acid production plant shut down for any reason, it can take from two to three weeks to restart the plant, he added, stating that regular maintenance and repair of the plant was critical.
High levels of maintenance and repair are also needed in other sections of the mine, with the danger of spontaneous combustion of hydrogen a reality in one of these sections, according to Loubser.
The mine has already - in 2004 and again in 2006 - had to deal with such an event, where the subsequent damage amounted to some 22 days of lost production and some N$250 million in loss of revenue and cost of repairs, he informed the court.
"Should the critical maintenance work and the work of contractors not be done," Loubser stated," over time the likelihood of an accident or catastrophic failure in the plant becomes exponentially more likely.
The effect of this would be a very real potential for high destructive damage to the plant, a total production stoppage causing [the mine] to suffer severe financial loss, damage to the environment through toxic spills at the plant, atmospheric releases and harm to the health - or at worst, death to employees in the vicinity of any such failure."
The union and its members were not represented in court when the application was heard.
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Namzinc was represented by Andrew Corbett, on instructions from lawyer Mark Kutzner of the firm Engling Stritter & Partners.
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