Striking platinum miners at Lonmin's Marikana mine in South Africa accepted a pay offer on Tuesday, ending six weeks of violent unrest that claimed 45 lives and rattled Africa's largest economy. The strikers, grouped on a bare soccer pitch near the mine, 100 km (60 miles) north-west of Johannesburg, cheered when they were told that management were offering a 22 percent pay rise, and said they would return to work on Thursday.
"I am happy - and forward with the struggle," said one of the striking miners, Sithembile Sohati. "It's a huge achievement. No union has achieved a 22 percent increase before," Zolisa Bodlani, a worker representative at Marikana, told Reuters. In another sign that weeks of labour unrest in South Africa's platinum belt were ending, the world's biggest platinum producer, Anglo American Platinum, said it had resumed its operations in the strike-hit Rustenburg area.
The spot platinum price fell 2 percent on the Marikana news to $1,627.49/oz and the rand firmed over 1 percent to 8.166 to the dollar. The wildcat mining strikes hitting a major sector of the South African economy had depressed the rand, increased the cost of insuring against default on South African debt and spooked some foreign investors into selling mining shares.
The conflict, most notably the police killing of 34 Marikana strikers on August 16, had also ignited criticism at home of President Jacob Zuma and his ruling African National Congress. It triggered accusations from political rivals that the ANC government was neglecting poor workers and siding with wealthy business owners. At least one analyst expressed concerns that the Marikana wage increase could trigger a rash of pay demands across a mining sector already being squeezed by low metals prices and rising labour and electricity costs.
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