Chairperson, hon colleagues, the Northern Cape is the largest of the nine provinces, taking up almost 30,5% of South Africa's land area. It borders on four other provinces, the Atlantic Ocean to the west and the countries of Namibia and Botswana to the north, making it an ideal gateway to West African markets. The province also offers profitable investment opportunities in minerals and metals processing, agriprocessing, fishing, mariculture and tourism. Four investment corridors have been developed: the Namaqua corridor, the Karoo corridor, the Diamond Field-Kalahari corridor and the Orange River basin.
The purpose of the oversight visit by the Select Committee on Economic Development to the Northern Cape was to discuss the impact of socioeconomic and social labour plans of the mines on local government municipalities; to discuss their strategies for and development towards achieving service delivery; to determine whether the respective mines' social responsibility plans towards the surrounding communities are being adhered to; to establish whether those communities were benefiting from the social responsibility plans of the surrounding mines; and to establish the form of such benefits.
The province accounts for some 7% of global diamond exports. The region also accounts for most of the country's iron ore production. Other important metals and minerals include copper, limestone, gypsum, rose quartz, tiger's eye, mica, verdite and semiprecious stones.
These metals and minerals are mostly processed outside the province, so there are opportunities for investors to establish value-adding beneficiation plants inside the Northern Cape, and not outside it. That is what the ANC wants to do. It wants to add beneficiation and value inside an area and not outside, hon Faber, like your DA does.
During our discussions with the communities, the committee established the fact that, even though each town has its own distinctive historical background, they all share similar problems, notably that land is used for marginal farming and communities have been historically denied access to large tracts of valuable mining, fishing, mariculture and agricultural land. This and poor infrastructure are but two of the serious economic challenges the communities are facing.
Mining has been the dominant industry within the municipalities, with mines controlling most of the land where there are opportunities for industries such as irrigation, agriculture and mariculture. With the reaching of an agreement in the land claims case, this situation will now change dramatically.
Chairperson, investment is required to upgrade accommodation facilities, develop new attractions and entertainment centres like theme parks, and upgrade air transportation networks.
These are some of the recommendations that the Select Committee on Economic Development has made, as can be seen in the ATC of 1 June, and which we would like to place before the House.
The committee must monitor the progress that has been made with the employment of a medical officer at the Alexander Bay Hospital. A new state- of-the-art hospital has been built by Alexkor but it has no doctors and no staff. Alexkor recently - about a week or two ago, before the provincial week - came to report to the committee. They said that they had a specialist doctor and a labour doctor and all that, but we need to do a follow-up to see if these are really in place because, according to the communities, they are not. What Alexkor told us, what the department told us, and what the communities said to us are three different things.
We need to follow up on the promulgation process of Alexander Bay, including identifying the institution responsible for promulgating phases. We need to follow up phase 1 projects and the progress made by the implementing organisation - either Alexkor or the Richtersveld CPA - and follow up phase 2 projects and progress.
We need to investigate housing in Alexander Bay. We have learnt that Alexkor is evicting people from the mining houses where miners are living. Now, if the son and daughter do not work on the mine where the father works, he alone can live in the house, but his family may not. We feel that it is grossly inhumane to do that. Alexkor has given the community and the committee the assurance that they will revisit their policies and take steps to prevent that situation.
Who is currently in command of the houses in Alexander Bay? Concerning the evictions by Alexkor, we want to know to whom the houses are being allocated at present, and on what basis these houses are allocated. We also want to know what the remaining term of the agreements for renting these houses is. There are mining consultancies and mining contractors. Now, these contractors also live in these houses.
You know, with deep sea diving, you only work around 20 days a year. That is what we have been told by the mining contractors. If the sea is rough you can't go out, whether the sun is shining or not. If the sea is not up to standard you can't go down and mine in the belly of the earth.
So, we need to find out from Alexkor what the rehabilitation plan for small- scale miners entails, because the contracts that Alexkor offered to small- scale miners at one stage had the small-scale miners getting 30%, while Alexkor got 70%. At another stage, the small-scale miners got 40%, while the big company got 60%. So, as a committee, we still need to follow up on these things.
We went to De Beers and had meetings with the Richtersveld community. There are projects. De Beers has now put in place mariculture projects, as well as conservation projects, for the communities. De Beers is also trying to establish a game reserve for the communities there and they are rehabilitating through ground art. Now, if hon Faber - who is from the Northern Cape - does not understand what ground art is, I want him to drive 480 km to the Richtersveld and see what ground art is really all about and how we, the ANC, think about job creation.
Chairperson, we want to place this report before the House for adoption. I thank you. [Applause.]
Debate concluded.
Question put: That the Report be adopted. IN FAVOUR: Eastern Cape, Free State, Gauteng, KwaZulu-Natal, Limpopo, Mpumalanga, Northern Cape, North West, Western Cape.
Report accordingly adopted in accordance with section 65 of the Constitution.