Collective Bargaining, Collective Blame? Seeking Accountability in the Aftermath of the Marikana Massacre
Abstract
The series of wildcat strikes[1] that culminated in the death of 34 mineworkers and injury of many more at the hands of police, at Marikana in the Rustenberg area of the North West Province on 16 August 2012, troubled South Africans and the international community.[2] In its aftermath many are examining the causes of the ‘worst incident of state violence since the apartheid era’,[3] in a country with the highest strike rate, most violent strikes in the world[4] and where mining houses have been found complicit in propping up the apartheid regime with the migrant labour and hostel system which remains in use.[5] Many rightly conclude that the Marikana massacre was not simply an illegal wage strike that got out of hand. Its causes were complex and arose from a socio-economic desperation cultivated by years of poverty, employee and community alienation from unions, government and mining houses, from which almost twenty years of democracy has brought little reprieve.[6]
This article provides a brief, preliminary overview of the various institutional stakeholders and their human rights obligations, whether in terms of domestic law, international law and/or voluntary codes with respect to the striking employees. It finds that, criminality aside,[7] serious questions need to be asked about the role of each of these stakeholders (as highlighted above) to the extent that they created and/or sustained the circumstances that led to the Marikana massacre. This article argues that the Marikana massacre clearly illustrates the failure of stakeholders to effectively uphold and advance human rights in the marketplace, whether through legislation or voluntarism. My preliminary conclusion is that such failure could be attributed to a lack of political will on the part of major institutional stakeholders such as the State and Lonmin, a leading mining company that was at the centre of the event, in their efforts to improve human rights. A further conclusion made is that other stakeholders, who are arguably more on the fringes, should commit to a more concrete human rights agenda. A re-examination of the true human rights agendas of all stakeholders is necessary and should specifically address, with urgency, the underlying disenfranchisement, income inequality and living conditions of the mineworkers that set the scene for the violent strikes.
[1]. Kwanele Sosibo ‘NUM: Lethal force ahead of Marikana shootings was justified’ Mail & Guardian 22 October 2012, last accessed from http://mg.co.za/article/2012-10-22-lonmin-caused-problem-at-marikana-say-police on 2 April 2013.
[2] Phillip de Wet ‘Questions and confusion remain at Marikana’ Mail & Guardian 23 August 2012, last accessed from http://mg.co.za/article/2012-08-23-questions-and-confusion-at-marikana on 2 April 2013.
[3] Charlayne Hunter-Gault ‘A Massacre and a Test for South Africa’ New Yorker, last accessed from
http://www.newyorker.com/online/blogs/newsdesk/2012/08/a-massacre-and-a-test-for-south-africa.html on 4 April 2013.
[4] John Brand quoted in Trialogue Sustainability Review November 2012 at 2, last accessed from http://www.trialogue.co.za/assets/pdf/TSR11 _Nov2012 _Full.pdf on 2 April 2013.
[5] Truth and Reconciliation Commission of South Africa Report, 1998 Vol 4 at paras 63-72.
[6] See eg. The Benchmarks Foundation Communities in the Platinum Fields (2012) last accessed from http://www.bench-marks.org.za/research/rustenburg_review_policy_gap_final_aug_2012.pdf, on 5 April 2013.
[7] Note that the Farlam Commission of Inquiry is still ongoing and the views expressed herein are preliminary. Discussions on the violence attributable to the police and striking workers respectively on the day of the shooting are not canvassed herein.
