Rising tensions explode into grisly violence at South African mine

reply to post by halfoldman


ok first i shouldnt even have to be dealing with this SA nonsense. they are Miners who work in the crappiest of crappy conditions. for even crappier wages for even crappier people. and they STILL can get a decent wage from the thieves robbing the African continents wealth.

these protestors were forcefully armed as witnessed by your own link

JOHANNESBURG - A Lonmin miner has described how he, and others, were forced to hold weapons and take part in a protest at the Marikana mine.

they were surrounded and boxed in with trucks and razorwire as witnessed by your own link

see .08-.16 or so for the info

they were then fired upon with gas grenades as witnessed in the OP video at .07

you can see the protesters at opening of the OP's vid ,they are not "charging" until they flee from the gas.

if you watch in the op vid from.07 you will see a police truck . as the camera pans the van moves up and you can see it stop when the camera pans back. that police truck is herding the protesters at the line of police.

now this is when the "charge" happens. but look at the miners. they have their hands on their head their heads down and they are ducking and running. now does that make sense? they dont even see the police as they are gunned down. and notice how many people didnt have weapons.

you said

The 4000 protesters were armed with machetes, spears and firearms (pistols and shotguns). There were 400 police officers.

i said they would find three guns . they found six.

The police retrieved six guns from the protesters, including one that had been taken from a police officer who was hacked to death by the workers earlier in the week, Ms. Phiyega said, as well as many machetes, cudgels and spears.

link .out of 4 thousand people and they didnt mention how much ammunition was found. none i would bet. and i didnt see many weapons in those fleeing miners hands.

and anytime you refer to "our people", as in

It's not OK for our people to be butchered like animals just because some group has a grievance.

but it is justified to gun down protesters who were fleeing.

I'd like to see people react when somebody with a massive machete or African spear runs towards them.

how would you react if you were surrounded by police with a hair trigger and all you really wanted was a raise?

well i know the SA BS reaction. mow them all down. its your line of thinking . blame the victim .that keeps SA and nearly all of Africa in such perpetual darkness. these people deserved raises . ask any american miner what hell they deal with. instead SA "police" kill . plenty more of those people to hire after the corpses of the dissenters are towed away . right.

those miners were fleeing and herded people that were gunned down. again sic. and ill gladly wash my hands of this thread if you address anything other than my

self-appointed "experts"

ness and you keep your

have no quotes or links or facts on this

and your

That's what one hears so far

at the corner .

o and while not saying it directly you like to say things like

It's difficult to blame the police for the violence in this case.

and then hit people with

I don't blame anybody.

reply to post by kykweer


how could they be marching anywhere when they were surrounded by razor wire and trucks?

Originally posted by Another_Nut
reply to post by halfoldman

 

sounds to me like you dont like to answer questions. instead you direct me to the official story.

I'm not convinced the incident can be judged simply by the clips, since they don't show the whole incident and what preceded the police reaction.

the video does show what proceeded the shooting. men running with their heads down trying to flee gas grenades . all while dodging "police" trucks and razor wire. but the 3 pistols 6 machetes and assorted sticks and rocks are what really caused it .
no point in trying to point out that you say your not convinced while coming up with these unverifiable "facts".

you wait for an official story. i think we all know what that will say.

edit on 17-8-2012 by Another_Nut because: (no reason given)

Tell me another_nut, if you were being charged by a group of people armed with various weapons, wot the hell would you do? stand there and ask them not kill or shoot first? when other people have already being killed, hacked or burnt to deaf.

And please don't give that old crap that these people are trying to fight for better wages, who the hell comes to a strike armed?

reply to post by Another_Nut

Yes, thanks for quoting me again, it is difficult to blame the police in this case, and no I don't blame anybody.

Why?
Information continues to come in, as you'd know since you refer to a lot of my links.

You talk only of the rights of these miners who turned on each other, but what about the rights of other people they killed and hurt, including two cops they hacked to death?
Is that OK in your country?
Do you know how crappy and dangerous it is to be a police officer in SA?
You are blaming one victim over another.
Don't lecture us about African exploitation - that's the dirt of Western countries and companies.

In fact, I'm not sure why your outrage keeps targeting me at all.
Target the mines, or the unions who made at least some of the miners carry weapons, and the ruling ANC.
Stop victimizing other people apart from armed miners who began their saga with violence.

It's not the fault of the police or anybody else - many miners walked away after painstaking 4 day negotiations.
There will be investigations, and we'll hear much more still.

And no it's not OK for strikers to carry machetes, spears, clubs and guns.
Your society wouldn't stand for it, so why must we have this terror?

But just keep venting your outrage at me personally.
Well done, I hope you're proud.

However I'm pretty thrilled that you also noted the part about forced (or at least expected) arming.
The mainstream hasn't picked up on this at all from what I hear, and as I said, there is a conspiracy angle to this.
Some persons or group used intimidation and the gullibility of these workers for nefarious ends.
That's what I suspect.
And it is OK to raise suspicions and unproven claims if one admits them as such.

reply to post by panicman66


again the police wernt being charged. the miners were fleeing . i see you didnt read any of my links. the "charging" is just a way to justify the killings. watch the video or respond to my facts.

edit to add

, who the hell comes to a strike armed?

they were forcefully armed

reply to post by halfoldman

Information continues to come in, as you'd know since you refer to a lot of my links.

i just wish you would. or at least address my facts. but you dont.

You talk only of the rights of these miners who turned on each other, but what about the rights of other people they killed and hurt, including two cops they hacked to death?

(edit to add the police were hacked it was the security that was lit.)
which 2? the ones from last week? they wernt "hacked to death".

On Saturday, two security guards were killed when the car they were travelling in was set alight.

link

In fact, I'm not sure why your outrage keeps targeting me at all. Target the mines, or the unions who made at least some of the miners carry weapons, and the ruling ANC.

not outrage but disbelief .

And no it's not OK for strikers to carry machetes, spears, clubs and guns. Your society wouldn't stand for it, so why must we have this terror?

not only do we .but our protestors are better prepared .The Battle of Blair Mountain

The Battle of Blair Mountain was one of the largest civil uprisings in United States history and the largest armed rebellion since the American Civil War.[1] For five days in late August and early September 1921, in Logan County, West Virginia, some 10,000 armed coal miners confronted 3,000 lawmen and strikebreakers, called the Logan Defenders,[2]who were backed by coal mine operators during an attempt by the miners to unionize the southwestern West Virginia coalfields. The battle ended after approximately one million rounds were fired,[3] and the United States Army intervened by presidential order.

reply to post by Another_Nut

Well thanks for that post, which is at least a bit more calm to me and not this barrage of constant attack, as if I justified this tragedy.

Your link above mentions the two murdered cops.

Two police officers, two security guards, three protesters and two other men had been killed by 8.30pm, said Captain Dennis Adriao.

allafrica.com...
They've been pretty much what outraged people here since Tuesday already.
Being hacked to death with a huge machete is just a gruesome thought.

On the previous page there's actually an account of how they were apparently lured to their deaths.
www.timeslive.co.za...

Your link to US history is very interesting, and it's the first time I hear about it.
Not sure they'll do it today however.

The thing is that this was never intended as an uprising.

reply to post by halfoldman

Your link to US history is very interesting, and it's the first time I hear about it. Not sure they'll do it today however.

with the way things are going here i pray you are wrong and we do still have the courage as a free people stand up , arm ,and defend .

reply to post by Another_Nut

Well it gives me a bit of insight into where your passion comes from on this issue.

But alas, we've had so much political violence and union violence, and when election time comes they will still vote ANC.

Many of these people were clearly misused, and I don't think we'll ever really find the instigators.
However I'll keep on following the issue and searching, and also listening to local radio because that had some of the best pointers so far into the intimidation and power-play behind the scenes.

As I've said, there may be a "third force" in SA.
Well police support from wider society has never been so great.

Of course that's the most obvious conspiracy - crimes of apparent disorder and chaos can justify new laws that restrict the liberty of the ordinary man or woman further.

I somehow see this coming.

reply to post by halfoldman

Well it gives me a bit of insight into where your passion comes from on this issue

.
true enough. i fear i may, all to soon, be on the business end of that police force. and if that time comes i will be armed . not that i want to be ,but i refuse to go down without a stand. my hope is that many of the free people of this earth rally before its to late.

But alas, we've had so much political violence and union violence, and when election time comes they will still vote ANC.

i fear November may be the same for us...no change. no mater who wins.

As I've said, there may be a "third force" in SA. Well police support from wider society has never been so great. Of course that's the most obvious conspiracy - crimes of apparent disorder and chaos can justify new laws that restrict the liberty of the ordinary man or woman further.

hows your local agenda 21?

reply to post by Another_Nut

Good question, to be honest I've never really heard of it.
Thanks for that.

I just had a glimpse at some of the links for it in SA going back to the mid 1990s, and I could link for a long time on what has become of land redistribution, our electricity crisis, our widespread failed municipalities and a looming water crisis.
Then we also had an AIDS crisis, and an influx of immigrants from other African countries, like 3 million Zimbabweans when that country basically collapsed.
We also had a Fifa Football World Cup in 2010 that promised all kinds of sustainable jobs, but all we have now is empty stadiums that cost so much to maintain that in Cape Town there were proposals to knock it down.
Much of our country is actually very arid, and I'm not sure how we will sustain it all.

This sounds like such drivel from what I gleaned, and some words and phrases like "rights" to clean air or a green environment seem like a cruel joke, especially to the poor.

I saw a Penn and Teller episode on what these environmental laws have actually done to private citizens, and we won't have clean air, but the state meddles in private business affairs to ban smoking.
So some of these phrases sound very scary in that they seem to meddle in private lives, rather than provide "development".

I'll read more on it, but I'm too exhausted for now.
It has been a long session.

Wow, I cannot believe what I am seeing. This will be coming to America before long. It's funny how the police act like they are afraid of the miners. They start backing up so far, like they were being fired upon. You would think they were facing a heavily armed force with the way they were acting. Wow. Just wow.

It's really bad that things come to this. It's too bad the ones making millions or billions from these mines can't shed a few more money for the hardworking miners. It's not pleasant to see people killing people. It's a common trait all throughout the animal kingdom but I would like to believe that our intelligence can master our fear and violence. People had been killed by the revolting miners and a very large group of miners had been killed by the cops. Violence begets violence and none of this is going to change until both groups refuse to resort to violence.

Originally posted by Another_Nut
reply to post by halfoldman

 

so "just what you heard so far " and which hasent been shown anywhere is now a "fact"? watch the video in your own response. they were herded , gassed, and mowed down. those are facts. they had their hands on their heads when they were killed! just watch the video. i dont need to hear from some "reporter". i watched it.

edit on 17-8-2012 by Another_Nut because: (no reason given)

Well, he IS closer than the rest of us are to where this happened.

And I definitely trust him more than the media-schmedia.
And no, this is not my first encounter with halfoldman.



I appreciate the information, halfoldman.

So do you personally think this is something that was more or less inevitable, things escalating to such high tensions on either side, that is?

I have always had this gut feeling that apartheid ended only in name but is every bit still there hiding in the shadows until no one is looking. But that now maybe it comes to a point of manifestation because of the severity?

So just kind of wondering what you think.

Originally posted by Ophiuchus 13
SMH a wish- I WISH ALL THE PRESCIOUS METALS AND MINERALS WERE REGATHERED that were not used for cientific technology. Its bad enough the miners have to deal with uncomfortable work conditions to make the supposed financially"well off" but spiritually weak happy with their trinkets & toys from such a poor inhabited continent ect. Now they cannot even speak out w/o this type of activity placed u pon them... 1 hopes GOD(s) PLEASE VISIT that region AGAIN along with similar regions of ignorance FIRST smh.

Yes!

RECYCLE

But we need more collection points for those kinds of things in smaller towns like mine. I would recycle a whole lot more if I had a place to send it. I've got circuit boards like you wouldn't believe, old computer parts.

Where I live, our local economy was built first on mines, potash and salt mines mainly, before the oil and gas overtook importance. Salt is pretty stable so there have never been any cave-ins that I know of, here. It must still be awful.

I wish that no one ever had to work in a mine ever again...not unless they want to, that is...but no more going under the ground for meager pay and little value to those for whom you are sent....

reply to post by queenannie38

Interesting that you mention that "apartheid" ended in name only.
It certainly ended in the sense that the petty segregation ended, however the elites and power system simply changed faces.

David Icke has an interesting quote on this that I used on a previous a thread about the Boer people (which deviated at times into the usual blame game and accusations that minority concerns were simply propaganda).
www.abovetopsecret.com...
Of course I don't agree with Icke on everything, but in the flood of uncensored ideas allowed by his conspiracy genre, he does have moments of astounding truth that others wouldn't dare mention.

Perhaps David Icke had a point in The Biggest Secret when he wrote:

So what's the difference between the Brotherhood's control of South Africa before and after the 'changeover'? One thing and one thing only: no-one is complaining anymore because overt control has been replaced by covert control. When there was minority dictatorship the global condemnation could be heard constantly: "It's not fair", the robot radicals would scream, "It's racism , it's dictatorship. Outrageous." And it was. But now the rallies and protests have stopped and Mandela is a hero to the world while the same people go on.

(Icke 1999: P.134.)

For a long time the world order was very happy with SA, and minority critiques, concerns and warnings were ignored, or even dismissed as reactionary and racist.
Now it's suddenly international shock and horror, but we'll see how long the interest lasts.

reply to post by halfoldman


Thank you for your thoughts. That is more or less the idea I had, but it was based on vague gut intuition so I'm glad to hear from someone who lives in the midst of it, so to speak. I say that because I don't know how much you are affected by things...and I'm not necessarily asking. Just not assuming, if you dig.

Are you a native South African or moved there? You don't have to answer that, either, if you don't want to. Or send a U2U. I might seem nosy but just curious, actually.

As soon as I get caught up, I will read that other thread as it interests me, too.

I really couldn't see, from the video, that the police were all that aggressive due to the backing up they did more than any charging forward. Of course, the video is just a portion of the events and I think that the beginning....that isn't shown...would be somewhat, possibly, enlightening.

Of course, when it comes to catching something on video, if it isn't planned, the beginning of the event or situation is spent getting the camera going, etc., so I guess that's maybe what happened here.

All I can say that I truthfully see evidence of is extremely heightened tensions...something not unusual for labor negotiations when they don't go smoothly. But I agree that it is indicative of something that the participants were forcefully armed and then did not hesitate to wield their weapons. Like it seems sort of set up if you know what I mean. Deliberately set up for provocation. But I am just speculating, for sure.

reply to post by queenannie38

I was born in Namibia, which was the former South West Africa, and virtually run as province of SA.
I've lived in SA from childhood.

I'm not close to that situation, but I've witnessed the terror of Cosatu strikes and how the unions trash everything in sight and intimidate others.
I met a man who was thrown off a train and his arms were amputated.

One is never far from violence and mob-rule in SA.
In Cape Town, for example, we've had riots over the past week or so which attempted to block off the airport, and people also died.

We had xenophobic violence in 2008 where foreigners were burnt in the streets (the last real global media interest in SA apart from the Football World Cup in 2010), and this sporadically continues.

It's just too much to really mention.
It's really been a tendency since the ANC entrenched their "people's war" in the 1980s (based around intimidation and torching people by necklacing), and we've seen all of this before to a lesser or greater extent.

Sometimes the violence seems orchestrated, while at others it just follows militant patterns that have become culturally acceptable to some.

I mentioned on p.1 that I heard a news report about Aljazeera footage showing the strikers shooting at police.

I think the relevant footage can be see at here: www.aljazeera.com...
Just click the thumbnail titled South African president launches probe into mine killings.

There are many other issues and politics involved now.

Ironically, many Internet sites traditionally associated with the "SA conservative white view" agree that it was a "massacre" (and many of these people were once conscripted in the police or the army, so their opinion matters).
They feel a particular group of miners were corralled and shot, similar to the findings and argument of my fellow poster here, Another_ Nut.
They go as far as to call it a "turkey shoot" (apparently a technical term).
mikesmithspoliticalcommentary.blogspot.com...-form

Then there's much other general opinion.
Most of it is on labor and political issues, with unsure forecasts and validity.

Some call a wage of R4000 a "slave wage".
Others say this is not so, and actually pretty good for unskilled or semi-skilled labor.
But most think for any union to offer and insist on R12 000 was just a deliberate false promise.

Some say mining conditions are bad, but others say platinum is in a gradual decline, and the mines are looking at retrenchments.
Unskilled SA miners are expendable.
The Chinese in Africa bring their own labor from China, even to countries with high unemployment, and that could become a future trend for international mines.

What will the unemployed masses in SA and Lesotho do then?
Sit in their rural villages without cash like their ancestors?
Without cellular phones, bedding, clothes and medicines?
Or will they join the masses of unemployed people in urban squatter camps?
By what standard does one say the mines are a curse or blessing?
Who else will employ these people?
By our experience whenever there is violent labor unrest companies leave, and more people sit about unemployed.
Not once has labor violence increased production, or our standing as a productive country.

Well, Julius Malema, a rival of President Zuma, is taking charge and defending the miners in custody.
That makes it political.

At the end of the day, whatever compensations are paid for police actions (or to the fallen and injured police), the hard-pressed taxpayer of SA will pay for it all.
We will pay - the personal income taxpayer of SA will pay (largely the much maligned tiny white demographic).

The question is, was it orchestrated?
Well, miners from Pondoland (Xhosa speaking) were recruited and this has been an issue in the North-West (Sotho speaking) mines for months.
The ANC are convinced they can impose what they consider "national demographics" on all the provinces, so some provinces have become a dumping ground for their poor and unemployed Xhosa supporters from the spectacularly mismanaged Eastern Cape.
Initially North West Province locals gang-raped a white women as a protest to "get attention", but the media didn't see this as significant.
censorbugbear-reports.blogspot.com...
This occurred in January 2012 already, long before the burning of the two female security guards.
So some see an element of ethnic (tribal) ANC social engineering behind all this.
Suffice to say that the black police in the mixed group of cops were not shooting at their own tribe.

Other nations and companies like the Chinese will one day come and say: "Stuff you all - we will mine it and bring our own labor".
They already do this in mining and construction in other African countries, and they have little time for local labor shenanigans.

The labor opportunities we have are a blessing, and far from slavery.
ANC historiography taught people that employers are a curse.
So when the former homelands like the Ciskei and Transkei became independent, many of the factories were destroyed in unrest.
But then what?
Yes, then what in a country with de facto 40 percent unemployment?

Nobody comes and forces people to work.
Similarly, nobody forced these strikers to carry weapons - yes they were encouraged or told to leave by the instigators - but they were not forced.
A sad situation for all, but the political opportunists are already visible.
But perhaps this will only be appreciated when the business is all gone.

Probably a lot of different angles and opinions on the tragedy, and also our local anxieties.

However, Aljazeera did show footage of protestors shooting, and the posters who felt it was a massacre also have a lot of support.

More superficially here it is often framed by the media as a case of who shot first, the cops or the protestors?
How typical.
It was all probably avoidable long before it got to that point.