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Abstract
In March 2003 a small community group, ‘The Concerned People Against Asbestos (CPA)’ based at Prieska in the Northern Cape, won a court case in a foreign country. That case may change the way in which multinational corporations behave in the developing world. Until now the hidden costs of mining in Southern Africa have been paid for by labour. The CPA's victory may also help to end that injustice. It is usual to depict communities like Prieska as dis-empowered and impoverished. Despite its lack of resources the CPA was able to synchronise an elaborate game of small and big politics. The group's victory suggests that such communities have levels of political and organisation skill which given the right alignments can be irresistible.
Notes
1. Unless otherwise indicated all archival materials cited are from the National Archives ofSouth Africa, Pretoria. The CPA Papers are documents held at the Prieska offices of The Concerned People Against Asbestos. They consist of letters, memos and minutes covering the history of the group and in particular the battle for legal compensation in the UK.
2. On the UK experience see Geoffrey Tweedale Citation(2000), Magic Mineral to Killer Dust: Turner & Newall and the Asbestos Hazard, Oxford: Oxford University Press.
3. During the 20th century South African produced all of the world's amosite and all but threeper cent of its crocidolite. Those fibres, which are known as amphiboles, are the most efficient at causing lung cancer and mesothelioma.
4. For a history of mining see Jock McCulloch Citation(2002), Asbestos Blues: Labour, Capital, Physicians and the State in South Africa, Oxford: James Currey.
5. In 1970 Gefco became a fully owned South African company.
6. By 1960 production had reached almost 200,000 tons and the asbestos mines were employing1,000 white and more than 20,000 black and coloured workers. See Annual Report, Department of Mines for the year ending 31 December 1960, Pretoria: Government Printing and Stationary Office, 1961 p.40.
7. At Cape Asbestos mines young men with no previous exposure were contracting asbestosisafter less than twelve months employment. See ‘Report on Health Conditions at Asbestos Mines’, Dr. G. B.Peacock, Assistant Health Officer, Pietersburg, June 1952, NTS 2258 695/280, volume 1.
8. ‘Asbestos Related Disease: A community-based Survey and Capture-Recapture Analysis’ by M. J. Hopley & G. A. Richards, Respiratory Units, Chris Hani Baragwanath Hospital and theJohannesburg Hospital, University of the Witwatersrand unpublished study, The CPA Papers, undated (1999).
9. See example and Judgment in Englebert Ngcobo and Albert Dlamini and Makhaladi AnastasiaCele and Thor Chemicals Holdings Ltd, High Court of Justice, London No 1994, N1212, 11 April 1995, and Judgment in Busisiwe Ngcobo vs. Thor Chemicals Holdings Ltd. Supreme Court, Court of Appeal London No FC3 95/6417/E, 9 October 1995, and Judgment, High Court, London Sithole & Ors. versus Thor Chemicals Holdings Ltd. No 1998-S-No.50Z, 27 May 1998, and Judgment, House of Lords on Appeal in the Cause Connolly (A.P.P) vs. RTZ Corporation PLC and others, 24 July 1997.
10. In a postscript in July 2003, Thor agreed to pay R24 million toward the clean up of its CatoRidge factory site. See The Cape Times, 24 July 2003.
11. Simultaneous claims were also lodged on behalf of four Italian workers employed at Cape'sTurin factory run by a wholly owned Cape subsidiary Capaminanto: by virtue of Article 2, The Brussels Convention, the Italian claimants could not be prevented from bringing their claim to an English court. The case was settled out of court.
12. ‘Memorandum from the Community of Prieska and the National Union of Mineworkers,Kimberley Region, to the Minister of Justice in South Africa on the case of Afrika & others vs. Cape PLC on Asbestos’, 4 November 1999. The CPA Papers.
13. See ‘Opinions of The Lords on Appeal for Judgment in the cause Schalk Willem BurgerLubbe (Suing as Administrator of the Estate of Rachel Jacoba Lubbe) and 4 Others (Appellants) and Cape PLC (Respondent) and Related Appeals, 20 July 2000’, p.13.
14. The Pretoria News, 14 November 1997.
15. See ‘Open Letter to the Rt. Hon Tony Blair, London, 24 November 1999’, The CPA Papers.
16. ‘Memo: Briefing Note on the Cape PLC, Case Richard Meeran Leigh, Day & Co, 16 September 2002’, The CPA Papers.
17. ‘Asbestos Victims in the UK Cape PLC case join legal challenge to proposed GencorUnbundling’, press release Leigh, Day and Co. 27 September 2002. The CPA Papers.
18. See ‘Cape PLC Settlement, 21 December 2001 between The Claimants, Cape PLC, Leigh, Day & Co, London and John Pickering & Partners, Manchester’.
19. See ‘Black workers to receive 45 million asbestos settlement’, The Guardian (London), 14 March 2003.
20. See ‘Gencor pays R460m to Settle Asbestos Claims’, Mail & Guardian, 30 June 2003.
21. ‘Summary’, Gencor Settlement between The Claimants, Gencor and Ntuli, Noble & Spoor’,Johannesburg, 13 March 2003.
22. ‘State must pay its part of deadly asbestos debt’, Business Report, 17 February 2003.
23. ‘Sick, dying asbestos miners to get half of claims’, The Cape Times, 30 June 2003.
24. See ‘Agreement between Gencor Ltd and the Cape Claimants and Leigh, Day & Co.Solicitors and John Pickering & Partners Solicitors’, 12 Match 2003, p. 27.
25. One case of mesothelioma involving a young surgeon who had been exposed to asbestoswhile a medical student was recently settled in a London court for £1.5 million. See ‘Surgeon Dies from Hospital Exposure to Asbestos’ in The British Medical Journal, 320:1358 (20 May 2000).
26. ‘Letter Aditi Sharma, Action for Southern Africa (ACTSA), London, to Cecil Skeffers, CPAPrieska, 28 February 2000’, The CPA Papers.
27. ‘Letter Aditi Sharma, Action for Southern Africa (ACTSA), London, to Cecil Skeffers, CPAPrieska, 20 December 2002’, The CPA Papers. Moodley, Shomenthree, James Blignaut Martin & de Wit Citation(2001), ‘Estimating Compensation: A Case study: Asbestosis and Mesothelioma in the Mining Communities of Prieska’, The CPA Papers.
28. See for example, ‘South Africa Asbestos Ruling May Bring Flood of Claims to London’,Lloyds List, 30 August 2000, and ‘Litigation that looms from lands far away’, Financial Times (London), 22 August 2000.