New service centre and clinic for EC miners

FOR many decades a labour reservoir for South Africa’s mining companies, the Eastern Cape has become the first province to open a medical facility dedicated to treating miners for workrelated injuries and diseases.

Opening the “One Stop Service” centre for mineworkers at the Nelson Mandela Academic Hospital (NMAH) in Mthatha yesterday, Deputy President Kgalema Motlanthe hailed the facility as an important “milestone” in the history of the country’s political and economic development.

The facilities, comprising two prefabricated structures, are situated inside NMAH’s grounds.

They feature consulting rooms where staff provide clinical services such as X-ray screening and physiotherapy rehabilitation for those with limited movement from injuries sustained while mining.

In an unusual twist for a medical facility, they will also help miners claim for compensation and UIF benefits. The centre forms part of government efforts to address the “fragmented” approach to the provision of social services to mineworkers.

Motlanthe said: “Of particular concern has been the inhumane conditions under which mineworkers live and work … and treatment meted out to ex-mineworkers once they are too ill to work or are retired due to social and health-related complications.”

He said government had established an inter-ministerial committee, comprising all relevant departments, to help families of mineworkers claim their benefits. The initiative was part of redressing past imbalances and a tribute to departed struggle leaders O R Tambo and Nelson Mandela.

“It is tragic that some of those who should have benefited from these services have passed on,” he said.

Also attending the opening were around 300 former miners who said they were “dumped” by mining houses due to injuries, chest infections or industrial action. Many appeared interested in getting help with compensation rather than medical benefits.

The Dispatch interviewed several elderly men, some on crutches and some suffering tuberculosis, who had spent two decades working on the mines. Mafuza Qhentse said he had received “not a cent” after being hospitalised for three months after breaking his hip during an underground rockfall in 1994, after 18 years as a miner. He struggled to feed his family on a R2 000 a month disability grant.

“The mine bosses kept my injuries under wraps and reduced the number of years I worked for them. Since the accident I have never been able to walk again or do anything for myself.

“My chest closes and it’s difficult to breathe because of the dust I inhaled underground.

“Life was tough in the mines and I have been from pillar to post [seeking compensation] but to no avail,” said Qhentse. –