{"id":13873,"date":"2012-08-24T15:10:56","date_gmt":"2012-08-24T13:10:56","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/08\/s-africa-platinum-labour-unrest-spreads-to-amplats\/"},"modified":"2012-08-24T15:10:56","modified_gmt":"2012-08-24T13:10:56","slug":"s-africa-platinum-labour-unrest-spreads-to-amplats","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/s-africa-platinum-labour-unrest-spreads-to-amplats\/","title":{"rendered":"S.Africa platinum labour unrest spreads to Amplats"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>\t\t<span><\/span><\/p>\n<p><span class=\"articleLocation\">JOHANNESBURG<\/span> Aug 24 (Reuters) &#8211; World No. 1 platinum<br \/>\nproducer Anglo American Platinum (Amplats) said on<br \/>\nFriday 100 workers had refused to go underground at its<br \/>\nThembelani mine in South Africa, a sign that simmering<br \/>\ndiscontent in the sector has not been contained.<span><\/span><\/p>\n<p><span><\/span><\/p>\n<p>There was no immediate threat to production at Amplats as<br \/>\nthe mine employs over 4,100 people, but the sector is on<br \/>\ntenterhooks in the wake of a violent strike at Lonmin<br \/>\nthat saw 34 striking miners gunned down by police last week.<\/p>\n<p><span><\/span><\/p>\n<p><span><\/span><\/p>\n<p>Amplats said in a statement that 6 workers were having talks<br \/>\nwith management regarding wage demands.<\/p>\n<p><span><\/span><\/p>\n<p>&#8220;The rest of the employees have proceeded underground and<br \/>\nthe situation is calm,&#8221; the company said.<\/p>\n<p><span><\/span><\/p>\n<p>Smaller producer Royal Bafokeng Platinum said it<br \/>\nhad received an undertaking that the 500 employees who<br \/>\nparticipated in an illegal strike earlier this week would<br \/>\nreturn.<\/p>\n<p><span><\/span><\/p>\n<p>It said allegations of intimidation would be independently<br \/>\ninvestigated and appropriate action would be taken if required.<\/p>\n<p><span><\/span><\/p>\n<p>&#8220;In spite of the loss of approximately 14,000 tonnes planned<br \/>\nto have been hoisted over the three days &#8230; total tonnes milled<br \/>\nfor the month should remain unaffected due to the stockpile<br \/>\nprocessed during this period,&#8221; it said.<\/p>\n<p><span><\/span><\/p>\n<p>In the fortnight since the Lonmin strike began the spot<br \/>\nprice of the white metal used for emissions-capping<br \/>\ncatalytic converters in cars has spiked over 10 percent.<\/p>\n<p><span><\/span><\/p>\n<p>Already struggling with soaring costs and weak global<br \/>\ndemand, the platinum sector has been hit by a union turf war,<br \/>\ntransforming workers into warriors as the Association of<br \/>\nMineworkers and Construction Union takes on the dominant<br \/>\nNational Union of Mineworkers.<\/p>\n<p><span><\/span><\/p>\n<p>South Africa sits on about 80 percent of the world&#8217;s known<br \/>\nplatinum reserves.<\/p>\n<p><span><\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"copyright\">\n<p>         \t\t\u00a9 Thomson Reuters 2012 All rights reserved<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>JOHANNESBURG Aug 24 (Reuters) &#8211; World No. 1 platinum producer Anglo American Platinum (Amplats) said on Friday 100 workers had refused to go underground at its Thembelani mine in South Africa, a sign that simmering discontent in the sector has not been contained. There was no immediate threat to production at Amplats as the mine [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[1],"tags":[830,2370,183],"class_list":{"0":"post-13873","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-south-africa","7":"tag-news","8":"tag-reuters","9":"tag-south-africa-2","10":"entry"},"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13873","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=13873"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13873\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=13873"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=13873"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=13873"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}