South Africa’s National Union of Mineworkers (NUM) has called on precious metals miner Sibanye-Stillwater’s shareholders to fire Neal Froneman as the company’s chief executive.
“If Sibanye shareholders want their mining operations to prosper in South Africa, they should remove him as CEO,” NUM president Joseph Montisetse was quoted as saying by Mining Weekly.
Froneman was accused of refusing to meet with trade union leaders in South Africa and of being the “major destroyer of jobs in the mining industry in the country”.
Montisetse accused Froneman of acquiring the Cooke operations in South Africa and then placing it on care and maintenance, which resulted in several job losses or retrenchments.
He also claimed that Froneman acquired Lonmin and Anglo American Platinum operations in the platinum belt, and also put some of the operations on care and maintenance.
“He then retrenched a lot of workers,” Montisetse said.
“Mineworkers are deeply trapped in poverty because of people of Froneman’s calibre. Why can't he take full responsibility as one of the people who are contributing to that?”
Mathew Nyaungwa, Editor in Chief of the African Bureau, Rough&Polished
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