Freedom Front Plus (FF+) North West leader Michael Groenewald says the nationalisation of mines in South Africa will not work at all due to rampant corruption.
Groenewald was a panellist during an elections debate on the SABC’s Elections 360 programme held at Brits in North West last night.
The programme discussed the role that the nationalisation of mines could play in helping address South Africa’s triple challenges of poverty, unemployment and inequality.
He says the solution lies in what he termed ‘in product manufacturing’.
Groenewald says, “It will never work in South Africa because we have corruption and as soon as there is corruption they will take the money from the mines and there won’t be continuous investments from private sectors.”
“We must understand that the continuous investment currently is coming from outside of South Africa. The mines must rather start and get to resolve to start more businesses for in product manufacturing, as soon as that is there, there will be better economy specifically in North West and with a better economy, there will be more employment,” he adds.
‘Mines should be nationalised’
The Forum 4 Service Delivery (F4SD) leader Abel Tau believes that the country’s mines should be nationalised.
Tau says at present, the mineral wealth of SA is benefitting a few white people.
He says the country’s minerals must benefit the black majority.
Tau says, “The mines must benefit black people, not the government, because remember if the mines are going to benefit the government, there is going to be big corruption. As you know that our country is under serious corruption, there is a big corruption in South Africa and we believe that we in South Africa, we can process our raw materials and sell them to other countries rather than take our raw materials and sell it back to us with a serious price and this must stop.”
