In the last few months the hottest topic doing the rounds is Acid Mine Drainage or AMD and how it will or already does affect the city of Johannesburg (JHB), the West Rand and the Cradle of Humankind World Heritage Site. 

It's a good thing that this issue is now out in the public's eye, exposed for all to see and those that have caused this issue (Mining Houses, Government) can no longer run and hide and be ignorant about this very serious issue. But while it's a good thing it's also not good that this has been kept knowingly under wraps for so many years. These issues have been pointed out to government and the mining industry for years now and those reporting them have been ignored, ridiculed and threatened. But years of persistance by unpaid, unfunded environmental groups and individuals have eventually paid off and as the saying goes, the TRUTH is OUT !!!!

Every day that the problem was blatantly being ignored, more damage was being done and more people were getting sick or worse as a result. To be blunt, the government and mining industry have been haphazardly playing with human lives so that they could keep cashing in on our minerals. Fixing the AMD disastser (yes it's a disaster) cuts into the profit margins or mining and government and that's why they've never done anything about it. Mines have repeatedly failed in their environmental responsibilities to South African's and have kept government officials off their backs using the usual modus operandi one would use to achieve that (sic).

So now an official report has been released by a team of experts appointed by government to review the problem. The report quite honestly only scratches the surface of this problem and once we start digging deeper will the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth be revealed.

The fact is that first we need to stop any further outflow from the mines, the mines themselves need to pay for this, NOT the South African taxpayer. They want to mine, they must foot the bill and they must be held responsible for every drop of water that leaves their land. This is the very first step along a very long road of remediation.

Once we have achieved this monstrous task, we then need to start cleaning up some of the damage done. In many cases this is not so easy, if not impossible. Uranium from tailings dams has been flowing down the rivers and left to blow in the wind for decades, for those who don't know Uranium, it's a nasty by heavy metal product from Gold production and is highly radioactive. This means that areas where it has been allowed to flow are now radioactive and considering that Uranium has a half life of around 80,000 years, it's gonna be a LONG time before we see some of those problems magically fixed. In areas around the West Rand, Carletonville more specifically, Uranium has even affected the groundwater due to irresponsible mining activities. It's funny how very little of the flurry of media reports actually addresses the Uranium and Radioactivity issue. Listen up ... there is no magic fix for that. Serious studies covering vast areas need to still be conducted to assess just how much radioactivity has spread from the mines and if any areas exceed the allowable dose of radiation then action will need to be taken.

We are only at the beginning of a very long, very expensive road and the SA taxpayer must stand up and say "NO, we will NOT pay for this"