CC image courtesy of CIA World Fact Book
The management of Kansanshi Mining in Zambia have allegedly decided to implement traffic lights and electronic gates at the mining site to bar black Zambians from entering with personal vehicles.
According to a report by the online publication, the Zambian Watchdog, Kansanshi Mining management is influenced by white people or, as the publication inappropriately stated, “boers”, from South Africa.
The report alleges black Zambians will not be allowed to enter into the mine lease. Furthermore they will reportedly have to park their vehicles outside the mine’s main entrance, which is approximately 10 kilometres away from their actual work places.
Furthermore the Zambian Watchdog reports only whites “and boers” will be permitted to pass through the main entrance and apparently the space which will be allocated for black people to park their vehicles is already being cleared.
Management will apparently monitor this to make sure only white people pass through the main gates through electronic gates equipped with traffic lights.
According to the Zambian Watchdog the electronic gates will “alternate with robots” (or traffic lights), which have already been installed, to prevent black people from entering with vehicles, with the exception of a few.
“President Sata promised to sort many things out but nothing has happened, yet things are now worse from the time PF (Patriotic Front) took office. Here most whites, mostly of South African origin, have no qualifications while others are working without permits, which even the local immigration office know[s] [about]. What a country,” the Zambian Watchdog quoted one of the miners, as saying.
The miner in question added: “We hope something can be done as soon as possible. Zambians are demeaned time and again. [There are] few Zambians in top management, however [they] are not helping at all as they themselves have become bootlickers to these unschooled chaps whose number has exceeded any imaginable number for expatriates…”
The miner suggested only a few within top management positions actually qualify as experts because “most of them have [a] very humble educational background.”
