Hardening Attitudes Among South Africa Miners as Dispute Spreads

September 11, 2012 from Al Jazeera English

Thousands of people have descended upon Marikana in a display of solidarity with the striking miners, all saying the workers' pay rise demand is "non-negotiable". But without a return to work, mediators, unions, and mine bosses say they will walk away from talks. Up to 40,000 jobs are threatened at the Lonmin platinum mine, officials have said. Al Jazeera's Tania Page reports.

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Marikana miners' strike

The Marikana miners' strike or Lonmin strike was a wildcat strike at a mine owned by Lonmin in the Marikana area, close to Rustenburg, South Africa in 2012. The event garnered international attention following a series of violent incidents between the South African Police Serv... Explore this topic

Julius Malema

Julius Sello Malema is a South African politician, and the former president of the African National Congress Youth League. Malema occupies a notably controversial position in South African public and political life; having risen to prominence with his support for African Natio... Explore this topic

Lonmin

Lonmin plc, formerly the mining division of Lonrho plc, is a producer of platinum group metals operating in the Bushveld Complex of South Africa. It is listed on the London Stock Exchange and is a constituent of the FTSE 250 Index. Its registered office is in London, and its o... Explore this topic

South Africa

South Africa, officially the Republic of South Africa, is a country located at the southern tip of Africa. It is divided into nine provinces and has 2,798 kilometres of coastline. To the north lie the neighbouring countries of Namibia, Botswana and Zimbabwe; to the east are Mo... Explore this topic

Miner

A miner is a person who extracts ore, coal, or other minerals from the earth through mining. There are two conceptions as to what this includes. In its narrowest understanding, "miners" are solely those persons who work at the face cutting, blasting, or otherwise working and r... Explore this topic

Mining

Mining is the extraction of valuable minerals or other geological materials from the earth from an orebody, lode, vein, seam, or reef, which forms the mineralized package of economic interest to the miner. Ores recovered by mining include metals, coal and oil shale, gemstones,... Explore this topic

Mining industry of South Africa

Mining in South Africa has been the main driving force behind the history and development of Africa's most advanced and richest economy. Large scale and profitable mining started with the discovery of a diamond on the banks of the Orange River in 1867 by Erasmus Jacobs and the... Explore this topic

Strike

Strike action, also called labor strike, on strike, greve, or simply strike, is a work stoppage caused by the mass refusal of employees to work. A strike usually takes place in response to employee grievances. Strikes became important during the Industrial Revolution, when mas... Explore this topic

Gold Fields

Gold Fields Limited is a South African gold mining firm, one of the world’s largest, which is listed on both the Johannesburg Stock Exchange and the New York Stock Exchange. The firm was formed in 1998 with the amalgamation of the gold assets of Gold Fields of South Africa Lim... Explore this topic

Politics of South Africa

The Republic of South Africa is a unitary, presidential republic. The President of South Africa serves both as head of state and as head of government - in the same manner as prime ministers of other nations, the President is elected by the National Assembly and must enjoy the... Explore this topic

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Marikana miners' strike

Julius Malema

Lonmin

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