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2012-08-07 20:06

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Cape Town – Western Cape pupils whose schools are closed will be moved to facilities with better opportunities, the provincial education department said on Tuesday.

“The aim is to improve opportunities for the learners concerned. We would like to place these learners in schools that are better equipped to provide a quality education,” department head Penny Vinjevold told reporters in Cape Town.

She said the 20 rural and seven urban schools facing possible closure were not ideal places of learning. The rural schools were faced largely with dwindling pupil numbers and teachers having to accommodate up to seven different grades in a single classroom.

The urban schools were plagued by a high dropout rate, poor academic performance, or buildings in poor condition.

There were 11 possible closures in the Eden Karoo, six in the Cape Winelands, five in Cape Town central, three on the West Coast and two in Cape Town north.

In Eden Karoo, enrolment ranged from 11 to 101 pupils.

Vinjevold said primary schools should ideally have between 650 and 800 pupils, and high schools between 1 000 and 1 200 pupils.

She said the problem was that schools with low numbers received less funding, even though their water, electricity and municipal rates were the same.

The proposal to close schools was met with opposition by various communities, the African National Congress and Congress of SA Trade Unions.

The department was criticised for targeting certain races and for a lack of transparency.

Exemption policy

Vinjevold provided reporters with a detailed breakdown of why each school had been chosen and where pupils could be transferred if the process went ahead.

About 4 000 pupils would be placed in different schools from 2013 if the proposal was approved. She said this did not mean Education MEC Donald Grant had already made up his mind.

The proposed placements were a work in progress and had been compiled to reassure parents that the department had done its research.

Any person, community, organisation or civil movement could offer their input at public hearings to be held from 18 August to 3 September.

Grant was expected to make a final decision by the end of September.

Vinjevold said parents should not worry about their child being placed in a school they could not afford.

“We’ve tried to match no-fee schools with no-fee schools,” she said.

In instances where a child was placed in a school with fees, an exemption policy would apply.

For rural areas, proposed transfer schools were between 6km and 27km from the original school. “In many cases, the learners will find it easier to get to school because buses will pick them up closer to their homes,” Vinjevold said.

Teachers would typically follow pupils to their new schools.

By DEVON MAYLIE

JOHANNESBURG—Africa’s biggest economy is running dangerously short of energy, even as the country sits atop what geologists say could be substantial gas reserves.

Enlarge Image

Agence France-Presse/Getty Images

South Africa’s shale-gas reserves are estimated to be among the world’s largest, but the region is home to rhinos and a telescope project.

South Africa, like the U.S. and other countries, is caught in a debate over hydraulic fracturing, the process of shooting millions of gallons of water, sand and chemicals into underground rock to release hard-to-access deposits. Multinational energy companies want to use fracking to release shale-gas reserves in this country’s Karoo region. But environmentalists are fighting fracking in the Karoo, a pristine, arid expanse that is home to the threatened black rhinoceros and the planned location of a $1.87 billion telescope.

Some energy and environmental-affairs officials have said they weren’t opposed to fracking but in April 2011 a moratorium was imposed on exploration in the Karoo after an uproar from environmentalists. The hiatus would give the government time to formulate a plan for production in the Karoo. The Department of Mineral Resources is due to present a report this month to the president’s cabinet, which will determine the fate of fracking.

“It’s what we call ‘the F word’ in our industry,” says Philip O’Quigley, chief executive at Falcon Oil Gas Ltd., which has applied for a right to explore for gas in the Karoo. “It’s an emotive industry.”

Royal Dutch Shell

by a South Africa research firm this year estimated the reserves at 450 trillion cubic feet.

Shell says exploration in the Karoo by other oil companies, mostly in the 1960s, identified “gas-bearing geological formations” but weren’t deemed commercially attractive because they were found deep below the earth’s surface. Today, new technology such as fracking could change that calculus, the Anglo-Dutch company says.

Enlarge Image

“Many in the industry do believe in the enormous potential of the Karoo,” says Falcon’s Mr. O’Quigley.

Jan Willem Eggink, Shell’s South Africa general manager for exploration, says the company needs to explore to determine how it could extract gas from the region. But that can’t happen as long as the moratorium bars drilling exploration wells.

Challenger Energy Ltd.,

also have applied for exploration licenses.

Tapping its gas reserves is essential to South Africa. The continent’s primary industrial engine imports 60% of its gas and oil needs. Nearly all of the country’s electricity production comes from state-owned utility Eskom Holdings Ltd., which has struggled to keep pace with demand. Energy shortages in 2008 led to rolling blackouts, disrupting manufacturing and the country’s crucial mining industry. Eskom says it risks running out of electricity while it builds two coal power stations. Even after those are built, the country will need more energy capacity by 2019 or face rolling blackouts again.

Even if the moratorium is lifted, South Africa still must entice anxious investors.

Sasol Ltd.,

in partnership with U.S.-based Chesapeake Energy Corp.

and Norway’s Statoil

ASA, carried out initial studies that Sasol says weren’t encouraging. Sasol, the world’s largest producer of motor fuel from coal, says it wants to keep exploring.

Shell says there might not be as much gas as geologists have predicted. The company estimates that it would spend $200 million to drill six wells for the first stage of exploration and that moving the Karoo to production would take about 10 years. “The longer we wait, the longer it takes to get the benefits,” Mr. Eggink says.

And the more environmental opposition could emerge.

Treasure the Karoo is campaigning to get fracking blocked. The environmental group says it will lodge an appeal with the Department of Mineral Resources if fracking is permitted or if exploration licenses are awarded.

Another complication arose in May, when South Africa won rights to host a radio telescope in the same area where Shell wants to frack. The project requires that industrial activity be located miles away for the telescope to work.

Anadarko Petroleum Corp.

in 2010 made a discovery that could put Mozambique, one of Africa’s poorest countries, in the big leagues of natural-gas producers. Estimates of the offshore discovery’s size would rank the country as the having the world’s 11th-largest natural-gas reserves.

A version of this article appeared August 6, 2012, on page B1 in the U.S. edition of The Wall Street Journal, with the headline: Fracking Debate Racks South Africa.

• Commentary

• By
  Devon Maylie
  

The time it takes South Africa’s government to decide on whether or not to frack won’t only make a difference to the country’s own energy shortage issues, but also to a handful of companies who are banking on a semi-arid region called the Karoo of being a significant gas producer.

Already, the timeline for making a decision has been delayed: South Africa’s department of mineral resources was due last month to present to President Jacob Zuma’s cabinet a recommendation on whether the country should lift a moratorium placed last year on exploration for gas in the region. That date has now been shifted to sometime in August.

With the country’s ruling African National Congress holding a key leadership and policy meeting in December little may get decided before then.

That could be bad news for companies who are eagerly awaiting the outcome.

Falcon Oil Gas applied for an exploration license before the moratorium was placed last year and is waiting for the final word. The Karoo exploration is one of three projects it has listed on its website as prospective gas finds, with the Karoo listed as the biggest acreage of exploration.

For bigger companies like Royal Dutch Shell, which has also applied for exploration in Karoo, the outcome is less pressing. But as the hunt for new reserves intensifies, any setbacks to more exploration throw up a potential problem.

Work to determine if the Karoo is even a viable area to proceed with development is set to take several years, so South Africa’s attractiveness to the big gas explorers could diminish anyway.

Jolyon Ford of Oxford Analytica pointed out that by 2015 there will be so much gas coming onto the global market that the extent to which South Africa is seen as a source of possible exported gas, as opposed to gas for local power generation, will likely be less than “the myriad of other new and existing exporters.”

And even if exploration is allowed, South Africa  is reassessing the role it wants the state to play in the mineral and energy sector so that could mean future changes to ownership and taxes.

Anne Fruhauf at Eurasia Group said:

“Regulatory issues also pose future risks. The government is playing catch-up with the broader regulatory framework for the gas sector.”

2012-07-31 22:15

Fracking methane in tap water

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Pretoria – Anti-fracking campaigners are preparing for a legal wrangle with the government, as time ticks on towards the scheduled announcement of the Karoo fracking report, expected in August.

The Treasure Karoo Action Group (TKAG) has set up a legal team to re-focus its legal strategy in preparation for an all-out confrontation to prevent fracking in the Karoo.

The lobby group’s chair Jonathan Deal said Cabinet was expected to make a decision in August on whether to lift the existing moratorium and allow exploratory drilling.

“We have engaged the well-established [legal] firm of Cullinan Associates, who will bring fresh thinking and decades of experience to our approach at this critical time in our campaign,” said Deal.

“We have been preparing for the moratorium to be lifted for a long time. We have selected the best legal minds that we can get to assist us to take this matter to the Constitutional Court, if need be,” he said.

Last year, the mineral resources department imposed a moratorium on fracking with the aim of implementing a study into the environmental impact of the controversial issue of drilling for shale gas in the Karoo – a process known as hydraulic fracturing, or fracking.

Mining Minister Susan Shabangu announced last August that the moratorium on prospecting for shale gas had been extended.

At the time, she said her department had to “engage with the public” on the contentious matter and, therefore, the extension of the moratorium was necessary.

God given

Deal said the activists’ fears about the awarding of fracking licences were awakened by statements made by Energy Minister Dipuo Peters during a recent departmental meeting.

According to Deal, the minister said: “It would be wrong for us to not use the resources that God left us with. This is a blessing that God gives us, and we need to exploit [it] for the benefit of the people.”

She said the people of the Karoo were “going hungry”.

“In the run-up to the decision by government we are re-focusing our efforts to present a high-powered, well prepared legal campaign which we believe will halt the minister in her tracks,” Deal said in a statement.

“We believe we have the support of right-thinking South Africans. We are not deterred by the fact that a number of people may have been influenced by Shell’s relentless pro-fracking propaganda, regarding the size of the gas deposits to the number of jobs that could be created,” he said.

“Our message to government is: ‘If you rule in favour of fracking, under the current circumstances, prepare for a long and costly legal battle as the people who will be most affected fight back’.”

THE Southern Cape Land Committee (SCLC) has joined the fracking debate, calling on the government not to allow the controversial shale gas exploitation practice to go ahead in the Karoo, without allowing landless residents a voice in its final decision.

Hydraulic fracturing, or fracking, is the only way the Karoo’s shale gas reserves — the fifth-largest in the world — can be explored. The gas reserves have attracted the attention of global energy groups, and those in favour of exploiting them — including Energy Minister Dipuo Peters — argue it could boost the economy and create jobs.

However, they are in an ecologically sensitive area and there is concern about environmental effects including water pollution arising from fracking.

On Friday, SCLC chairwoman Angela Conway said the committee recognised that the fracking issue was “one of the most crucial campaigns we have ever faced”.

“The perception that (the fight against) fracking is confined to a struggle by white farmers seeking to retain the status quo and obstruct job opportunities is simply not true. Fracking will affect the whole country and all its citizens, especially in a water-scarce country like ours,” she said.

The SCLC called on the government to extend the fracking moratorium implemented last year, and to ensure all Karoo residents were engaged in the debate.

The committee said issues that needed addressing included whether and how fracking would help the country address patterns of skewed land ownership in the Karoo and job creation for the poor.

Ms Conway said the SCLC did not believe fracking would address the ever-widening gap between the rich and the poor.

“The conversion of agricultural land for projects like fracking and leisure development for the elites should be discouraged in order to engage in proactive, state-driven land redistribution,” Ms Conway said.

The SCLC said the state had a key role to play in putting people first.

“South Africa is not for sale. We call on all peaceful loving South Africans to urge our government not to fall for the empty promises of multinational companies and promises of creating jobs, at the expense of future generations of our beautiful country.”

Earlier this week the Treasure the Karoo Action Group warned government to prepare for a legal battle that could end up in the Constitutional Court.

The group expected government to soon approve exploration licences that would clear the way for fracking.

Some estimates reportedly put South Africa’s potential shale gas resource at 485-trillion cubic feet of gas.

According to a report by Econometrix, commissioned by Shell, the shale gas industry could add up to R200-billion a year to the country’s gross domestic product and create 700,000 jobs.

The controversy over fracking (hydraulic fracturing) stems from concerns about the safety of the technology, which uses large amounts of clean water mixed with sand and chemicals to crack underground rocks and release shale gas. Detractors of the practice fear contamination of ground water supplies.

Garden Route Media

Sanbona Wildlife Reserve in the Klein Karoo, a leisurely three-hour drive from Cape Town, is offering guests 50 percent off standard rates at three of its luxury lodges – Dwyka Tented Lodge, the historical Tilney Manor and the family friendly Gondwana Lodge over the Wildflower Season from August to September 2012.

During the Wildflower Season guests can enjoy an annual flora extravaganza when a kaleidoscope of lush wildflowers cover a vast area of the reserve. Five specific wildflowers have been noted which include Bushman’s Poison Bulb (Boophane disticha), Babies Bottoms (Gibbaeum heathii), Wild Rosemary (Eriocephalus spp.), Butter Tree known as Botterboom (Tylecodon paniculatus) and the Karoo Boer Bean (Schotia afra). 

In order to take up the 50% off special, guests must book and pay within seven days, and rooms are subject to availability. This special offer includes five-star accommodation, all meals, selected beverages and two game drives per night booked. It does not include transfers or spa treatments.

To book your safari during the Wildflower Season, contact 041 509 3000 or email reservations@shamwarigrioup.com.

Advertorial

Gold – The perfect time to buy!

The Treasure Karoo Action Group (TKAG) has set up a legal team
to re-focus its legal strategy in preparation for an all-out confrontation to
prevent fracking in the Karoo.

The lobby group’s chairman Jonathan Deal said Cabinet was
expected to make a decision in August on whether to lift the existing moratorium
and allow exploratory drilling.

“We have engaged the well-established [legal] firm of
Cullinan Associates, who will bring fresh thinking and decades of
experience to our approach at this critical time in our campaign,” said
Deal.

“We have been preparing for the moratorium to be lifted for
a long time. We have selected the best legal minds that we can get to assist us
to take this matter to the Constitutional
Court, if need be,” he said.

Last year, the mineral resources department imposed a moratorium
on fracking with the aim of implementing a study into the environmental impact
of the controversial issue of drilling for shale gas in the Karoo
– a process known as hydraulic fracturing, or fracking.

Mining Minister Susan Shabangu announced last August that the
moratorium on prospecting for shale gas had been extended.

At the time, she said her department had to “engage with
the public” on the contentious matter and, therefore, the extension of the
moratorium was necessary.

Deal said the activists’ fears about the awarding of fracking
licences were awakened by statements made by Energy Minister Dipuo Peters
during a recent departmental meeting.

According to Deal, the minister said: “It would be wrong
for us to not use the resources that God left us with. This is a blessing that
God gives us, and we need to exploit [it] for the benefit of the people.”

She said the people of the Karoo
were “going hungry”.

“In the run-up to the decision by government we are
re-focusing our efforts to present a high-powered, well prepared legal campaign
which we believe will halt the minister in her tracks,” Deal said in a
statement.

“We believe we have the support of right-thinking South
Africans. We are not deterred by the fact that a number of people may have been
influenced by Shell’s relentless pro-fracking propaganda, regarding the size of
the gas deposits to the number of jobs that could be created,” he said.

“Our message to government is: ‘If you rule in favour of
fracking, under the current circumstances, prepare for a long and costly legal
battle as the people who will be most affected fight back’.”

August 2 2012 at 10:17am
By John Yeld

Comment on this story

---

INDEPENDENT NEWSPAPERS

Jonathan Deal is chairman of the Treasure the Karoo Action Group(TKAG) giving a talk against the hydrauolic fracturing in the karoo at 6 Spin street restuarant. Picture: Courtney Africa

Cape Town – The Tresure the Karoo Action Group, which is opposed to fracking for shale gas, has warned the government to prepare for “a long and costly legal battle” that could go all the way to the Constitutional Court.

It expects the government to approve exploration licences soon, clearing the way for the probable use of this controversial extraction method in the Karoo, but says those likely to be most affected by fracking will fight back.

However, the group’s statement comes at the same time as its erstwhile legal representative, Havemann Associates Incorporated, has instituted High Court action against its chairman, Jonathan Deal, pictured, for alleged non-payment of R424 195 in legal fees, which was incurred between June last year and June this year.

The group announced this week it had appointed a new legal team which would “bring fresh thinking and decades of experience to our approach at this critical time in our campaign”, but did not mention the summons.

The group also announced that it had concluded agreements with “like-minded opposition groups” to form a broad anti-fracking alliance.

Deal said that in the run-up to the government’s expected decision, the group was “refocusing our efforts to present a high-powered, well-prepared legal campaign which we believe will halt [Mineral Resources Minister Susan Shabangu] in her tracks”.

The government’s recent climb-down over the Gauteng highway improvement road tolls was proof that ordinary people had had enough of its “riding rough-shod” over their will. – Cape Argus

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A frontrunner in the race to build new nuclear power stations in South Africa conducted a costly schmooze campaign during an earlier round of bidding, the Mail Guardian can reveal.

As the government prepares to reopen bidding for the building of  a fleet of nuclear power stations, an investigation of the withdrawn 2008 tender, known as Nuclear 1, suggests that the frontrunner, then and now, French nuclear parastatal Areva, tried to manipulate the process by buying political favour.

The MG reported in February that Areva was teaming up with a Chinese partner to form a politically favourable consortium.

The new contract, which could be put out to tender later this year, will be worth up to R1-trillion, the biggest in South African history.

Areva’s rival, the United States company Westinghouse, hinted this week that it, too, was reviewing its strategic alliances by initiating “a consultation process with staff to possibly restructure its operations … in anticipation of nuclear new-build in the near future”.

Areva’s attempts to cosy up to a politically connected elite to win the 2008 nuclear tender were ultimately unsuccessful, but it shows how much bidders are prepared to invest to make these connections.

In 2008, Areva’s strategy included a takeover of the politically connected uranium mining company UraMin to secure uranium rights in the Karoo, Namibia and the Central African Republic.

Rumours have circulated for years that the French company paid too much for UraMin to gratify former president Thabo Mbeki’s allies, at least partly because it believed it would help it to win the huge South African nuclear contract.

But when the ANC sacked Mbeki in September 2008, Eskom withdrew the Nuclear 1 tender. The parastatal later said it could not afford the deal, but the timing suggested the events were linked.
It has been speculated that the Jacob Zuma faction, in control of the ANC party machine since the Polokwane conference the previous December, did not want the Mbeki-led government to dispense the patronage from such a large contract.

The cancellation of the tender left Areva exposed to the full cost of buying UraMin, which it bought at the top of the uranium bull market for $2.5-billion. When the Fukushima nuclear disaster in Japan in March 2011 burst the uranium bubble, Areva announced gigantic losses, writing down its UraMin assets by more than $2-billion.

This led to a French parliamentary investigation earlier this year of Areva’s handling of the UraMin takeover, which found “some malfunctioning in the company’s governance and decisional process”, but no clear evidence of fraud.

Political machinations
The Nuclear 1 tender highlights the financial consequences of megadeals built on a surreptitious exchange of political and commercial favours.

The MG has traced several sources close to the uranium scramble that preceded the tender, who provided circumstantial but telling testimony of the machinations that characterised the process and drove up UraMin’s purchase price to astronomical levels.

Rob Scott, former counsel to UraMin’s chief executive, said: “Did we have a soft blessing from the politicians? I would be surprised if we didn’t. Did any [politicians] make money from it? Not that I’m aware of. Did it suit agendas? Absolutely. Remember that Mbeki wanted South Africa to become a nuclear power.”

A consultant to UraMin said there had been an assumed quid pro quo: “The deal was that Areva would buy UraMin and get the nuclear tender in return. Areva paid too much for UraMin – it’s worth half [the $2.5-billion]. But they were going to get contracts for reactors and an enrichment plant worth 10 times as much.”

Even Areva, following an internal investigation, admitted to paying too much for the assets. “UraMin’s acquisition for $2.5-billion was made at a high price with a premium of approximately one-third compared with the intrinsic value that this asset represented for Areva,” it said.

But did the company pay this amount to buy political favour? This is harder to prove, but the chronology of a uranium scramble spanning South Africa, Namibia and the Central African Republic is persuasive.

The first stage of the process, between 2004 and 2006, was the speculative acquisition of uranium deposits in these countries by start-up mining company UraMin, which cut in people close to political decision-makers.

In stage two, between 2006 and 2008, Areva bought UraMin and consolidated its nuclear bid consortium allegedly partly in the belief that by gratifying people close to political decision-makers in South Africa it would encourage favourable consideration of its nuclear bid.

Areva told the MG it had “no intent to reopen debates on that issue that drew intense media attraction at the beginning of 2012. The only priority of the company is its recovery.”

Mbeki’s spokesperson, Mukoni Ratshitanga, said the allegations of political influence-buying were “entirely without basis”, “possibly defamatory” and “typical

of the work of the apartheid-era Stratcom operatives, who concocted false allegations against their real and perceived opponents with deliberate malicious intent”.

South Africa
Matiki Chikala is the chain-smoking, tough-talking founder of Mago Resources, which he established in 2003. He said he saw the potential of uranium in the early 2000s and applied to the then department of minerals and energy for unused prospecting rights, particularly in the Karoo, which he hoped to develop once he found a financier.

In 2004 he was introduced to a company, Beranjou, that wanted to finance Mago’s uranium prospects.

Beranjou, which later became UraMin, was an opaque British Virgin Islands-registered company represented by Australian geologist Adrian Lungan and South African businessperson George Roach. Its financial backer was Canadian banker Stephen Dattels.

The UraMin consultant said the company was started by business “cowboys”, but they knew they had to achieve scale – or at least a semblance of it – to attract an established mining company to buy them out.

Lungan and Roach did not respond to requests for comment. Dattels, through his lawyers, denied “all impropriety alleged … or implied … regarding UraMin’s dealings” and said the MG‘s questions were “replete with inaccuracies”.

In March 2005, Chikala signed an agreement with Beranjou setting up a joint venture in which Mago had 26% and Beranjou (later UraMin) 74%. The company hired advisers to assist in applying to the minerals department for up to 70 uranium prospecting rights in South Africa.

The consultant, who asked not to be named because of his business interests, said dealing with the department was “a nightmare”.

“Corruption was so rife that we’d be allocated mineral rights, but when we looked again they’d been allocated to one of their friends to blackmail us.”

Company meeting minutes from November 2005 provide insight into the way UraMin attempted to counter its difficulties in applying for permits. In the minutes, Dattels complained that the “non-issuance of licences” was “a problem” and he “needed to get answers” because it was “a critical time” where “speed is of the essence”.

His solution was to “take council [sic]” from influential Ghanaian businessperson Sir Sam Jonah by naming him as one of two representatives authorised to deal with the department. A day before the meeting, UraMin had appointed Jonah, then chairperson of AngloGold Ashanti, to its board.

The other person nominated to interact with the department was Mbulelo Rakwena, a senior South African diplomat with political clout.

Jonah’s appointment would turn out to be an inspired move. The consultant said Jonah and Mbeki were “big mates” and that, “if it wasn’t for Jonah, this entire [UraMin] deal would never have happened”.

Jonah’s lawyer said: “The UraMin applications for prospecting rights in South Africa had already been lodged before our client became a director of UraMin and our client has never spoken to Mr Mbeki about [the] same.”

Rakwena denied “with contempt any insinuation of wrongdoing on my part”, but declined to answer detailed questions.

Chikala and the consultant both identified the deputy director general of the minerals and energy department, Jacinto Rocha, as the department’s key day-to-day decision-maker on the awarding of the rights UraMin wanted.

They also noted that Mbeki’s ­deputy president, Phumzile Mlambo-Ngcuka, was a key influence behind the scenes. She had been the minerals minister during the previous six years and many of the department’s decision-makers were her appointees.

Even after her departure, the ­consultant said, she remained so influential that she was effectively “still the minister”.

“I’m not saying Rocha did anything wrong. He just bowed to pressure from above. He was the guy who every­one above him referred to, to make sure that everything went according to plan.”

Rocha said he had been promoted to deputy director general shortly before Mlambo-Ngcuka left, but insisted she “did not rule from the grave” and that “ministers do not decide on mineral prospecting rights”.

Mlambo-Ngcuka declined to comment.

Political connections
By mid-2006, UraMin was highly vulnerable to political risk. In a listing statement in April, the company noted that competing applications had been submitted to the department for the same prospecting rights in South Africa. By then it held only three of 70 mineral prospecting rights for which it had applied.

“There can be no assurance that the group will be granted new-order prospecting rights … The group’s inability to acquire prospecting rights on certain properties in South Africa could have an adverse impact on the development of its projects in the country,” the statement said.

At this point, UraMin’s South African joint venture was owned by UraMin Incorporated (74%) and Mago Resources (26%). A month later, it cut another empowerment group into its shareholding. In May 2006, UraMin had written to the department proposing that a new empowerment company, Lukisa, be given a share of Mago Resources’s stake.

It did not disclose the identity of those involved in Lukisa in its letter to the department, or when it announced that Lukisa had gained an 8.75% shareholding in the UraMin-Mago-Lukisa joint venture on June 6 2006.

According to Chikala, UraMin had gained a controlling stake in his company and then proceeded to work him out and bring in more politically connected players.

According to a company share register, Lukisa’s majority shareholder was Tefo Maloisane. Four sources have independently confirmed that Maloisane was close to Mlambo-Ngcuka’s brother, Bonga Mlambo.

Chikala said Dattels introduced Maloisane and Mlambo to him as prospective new empowerment shareholders.

“When Maloisane was introduced to me, he came with Mlambo. And when I complained, saying I did not want a scandal with the deputy president’s brother, they pulled Mlambo off a little bit. Then they had meetings behind the scenes, but Mlambo was there, definitely.”

Two other sources familiar with Lukisa confirmed that Maloisane and Mlambo were “close” and  the relationship stemmed from Mlambo’s role as “a kind of Zulu uncle” to Maloisane.

Rocha said: “Companies are clever. They think politically about who they will bring in to try and influence the decision-maker. You can’t chase away the deputy president’s brother – that would be discriminatory. He’s also a historically disadvantaged South African. But it’s the companies who choose to bring politically connected people in, not decision-makers in the department.

“My job was simply to make a decision in line with the [Mineral and Petroleum Resources Development] Act and I did so without fear or favour.”

Mlambo could not be reached for comment.

Maloisane said: “I’m a professional businessman with qualifications; by no means do I find myself where I am because of connectivity.” He referred further questions to Areva.

Dattels said Uramin “worked constantly to ensure its operations in South Africa conformed in all respects to BEE [black economic empowerment] requirements” but did not respond to questions about Maloisane, Mlambo and Mlambo-Ngcuka.

He denied that UraMin had edged Chikala out improperly, saying the company bought Chikala’s stake for $51-million in February 2007.

According to the consultant, slow progress in obtaining permits in South Africa made UraMin look elsewhere for uranium deposits to pump up its asset base.

Nevertheless, by the time it sold its assets to Areva in July 2007, it held rights to about half the surface area of the Ryst Kuil uranium channel in the Karoo and had sealed an agreement in principle with a rival company for its share of the rest (See “Another deal on the side”).

Namibia
UraMin bought the company that held the mineral rights to the promising Trekkopje mine in the Namib Desert for $4-million in June 2005.

But by the time UraMin listed on the London Stock exchange in April 2006, the company was forced to declare: “The directors believe that the application for renewal of the existing [licence] is unlikely to be successful and no assurance can be given that the [new] application will be successful. In the event that neither application is successful, the group will have no assets in Namibia.”

The company needed political insurance, as it had in South Africa, and a secret report commissioned by Areva in 2011 – following the collapse in value of the UraMin assets – suggests that it bought that insurance.

The report, by Swiss private intelligence firm Alp Services, alleged that Hage Geingob, who was a senior Swapo politician, Namibia’s first prime minister and the man tipped to be its next president, “received $300000 for facilitating the sale of UraMin to Areva”.

Scott recalled contacting Geingob to give him an update about Uramin’s progress in Namibia.

Reacting to the Alp report, Geingob told the Namibian newspaper New Era in February that his company, HG Consulting, was employed by UraMin between 2006 and 2007 and was “paid for services rendered”, namely “UraMin obtaining a mining licence”. He denied receiving any money for facilitating the UraMin sale to Areva.

Dattels said the same, adding that Geingob “made the appropriate disclosure to the Namibian Parliament”.

But the Alp report went further, suggesting that Geingob had “worked according to the wishes” of the ANC’s treasurer general at the time, Mendi Msimang.

If true, the crossborder co-operation between senior liberation party cadres lends weight to suggestions that UraMin enjoyed top-level backing in both the South African government and the ANC.

Geingob refused to answer other questions about his alleged interaction with Msimang.

Msimang said: “I had no wishes and was in no way aware of, or involved in, any such transaction. I have no personal relationship with Geingob other than in the context of the bilateral relationship between the ANC and Swapo.”

Central African Republic

UraMin acquired its third major uranium asset, the Central African Republic’s Bakouma mine, for $27-million in June 2006 through Mbeki’s direct intervention, according to the UraMin consultant.

Mbeki’s alleged role in facilitating the deal is hearsay, but President François Bozizé had been fighting a sustained rebel incursion by supporters of ousted rival Ange-Félix Patassé for nearly a year and had begun to lean on South Africa for support.

In January 2006, the South African military went to the Central African Republic on a “fact-finding mission” and Bozizé visited South Africa on a “working visit” in April.

A South African foreign affairs department communiqué emphasised the Bozizé entourage’s dealings with “a wide spectrum of South African business people and organisations that have interests” in the Central African Republic with an emphasis on “mining and exploration”.

It is, therefore, possible that a beleaguered Bozizé was trading off some of his country’s prized mineral deposits, including uranium, for South African military support, which was forthcoming later that year.

A United States diplomatic cable in December 2006 concluded that South Africa’s intervention was designed to “stabilise” the Central African Republic, but added that “mining interests, while not the dominant factor, no doubt played a role in the [South African government’s] decision to become involved”.

According to several sources, UraMin’s key point man for the Central African Republic deal was Jonah, who was influential among the West African elite.

Scott said Jonah’s “[contacts] book in Africa is very extensive”.

“I know Bozizé came [to South Africa] a couple of times because Sam actually claimed for expenses,” he said.

Scott also recalled an incident in which UraMin staff working in the Central African Republic were arrested en route between Bakouma and the capital, Bangui, and Jonah negotiated their release.

Jonah told the MG he had not wined and dined Bozizé in South Africa, and had never discussed UraMin with Mbeki.

Enter Areva
With Bakouma in the bag, UraMin had assets in three countries and was sufficiently bolstered by its balance sheet and political connections to find a buyer.

The “key facilitator”, said the consultant, was Jonah, who served on Mbeki’s international investment council – incidentally, with Areva chief executive Anne Lauvergeon. Jonah was a nonexecutive chair of the UraMin board for at least six months before it was bought by Areva.

The first tentative engagement between UraMin and Areva began in October 2006, according to a UraMin circular to shareholders.

On July 31 2007, Areva sealed a $2.5-billion deal for UraMin, paying $7.85 per share – 21% more than the market value at the time.

Jonah was handsomely rewarded: according to a director’s circular, he held nine million shares and would therefore have walked away with about $70.65-million (R505-million at the exchange rate at the time).

His company, African Facilitation Services, also received a 0.4% commission on the Areva deal worth $10-million. Of all UraMin’s directors only Dattels, its founder and executive deputy chairperson, made more money.

Jonah’s lawyer confirmed these figures were “roughly correct”, but said: “There is no nexus between our client’s involvement in Mbeki’s international investment council and the events which transpired.

“Areva was not the only company which showed interest in UraMin. All negotiations with prospective buyers were conducted on UraMin’s behalf by a reputable Canadian investment bank, BMO, and Areva’s advisers were Rothschild.”

Dattels did not answer questions about Jonah’s role in negotiations with Areva, except to confirm that he was UraMin’s nonexecutive chairperson at the time.

Scott echoed Jonah, saying that UraMin “played a clever commercial game”.

“We made sure it was known we were meeting one another. Prices were high, there were supply shortages and huge demand. People were desperate for uranium. Did the French pay a princely sum? Absolutely.”

Scott added that Jonah’s link to Lauvergeon, through Mbeki’s investment council, was unforeseen and “possibly really lucky”.

At the time Areva also thought it had sealed a great deal: uranium deposits in three African countries and a politically connected company in its fold to bolster its bid for the South African nuclear tender.

Areva’s next move
Lukisa’s frontman, Maloisane, was appointed Areva’s country manager for South Africa in July 2008 – at the time when Eskom was considering bids from both Areva and Westinghouse.

Chikala said political decision-makers would have noticed that a company associated with the deputy president’s brother was part of Areva’s bid consortium.

In the long run, the ANC’s elective conference in Polokwane proved to be a massive defeat not only for Mbeki and his political allies, but also for Areva. Eskom’s board put the tender award on hold in the week that the ANC sacked Mbeki and the tender was formally withdrawn two months later.

Areva will have to rebuild its alliances and wait for the tender to come around again. And it is likely it will want to recoup some of its misplaced investments (See “Another deal on the side”).

Meanwhile, the ANC’s next elective conference in Mangaung looms with the promise of a similarly decisive impact on politically backed megadeals. The question is: Who will bear the cost of political machinations this time?

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Another deal on the side

Shortly before selling to Areva, UraMin agreed to acquire another company that had participated in the scramble for uranium rights in the Karoo near Beaufort West.

There are parallels between Areva’s purchase of Great Karoo Metals and its acquisition of UraMin that suggests it wanted the same outcome from both: the indulgence of people close to then-president Thabo Mbeki in the hope of favourable consideration in the nuclear tender.

The ANC’s Western Cape chairperson at the time, James Ngculu, held a 6% stake in Great Karoo and was briefly deputy chairperson of the private equity firm that held a further 35.75% stake.

Between November 2004 and May 2005, Great Karoo invested R40-million in buying and developing uranium rights. Areva bought Great Karoo Metals for $50-million in August 2007, a tenfold increase on Great Karoo’s initial investment.

According to media reports, Ngculu was a key supporter and funder of the Mbeki campaign in the build-up to the ANC’s Polokwane conference in December 2007. In the weeks before the conference, the Sunday Times quoted Ngculu as saying he would defend Mbeki “with my soul” and the Mail Guardian reported that lobbyists for the Jacob Zuma faction had noted he displayed “particularly deep pockets” on the campaign trail.

Responding to the MG‘s questions, Ngculu said it was “offensive” and “devoid of any truth” to suggest that he had supported Mbeki for factional interests. “I was a staunch ANC man and never a ‘lobbyist’ or ‘outspoken supporter’ as you suggest, save to support him as the elected president of the ANC.” He said his reported financial and other ties to the pro-Mbeki campaign before the Polokwane conference were “rumours mongered by the ‘unnamed sources’ so loved by your paper”, but did not rebut the Sunday Times quotation attributed to him.

In terms of the uranium deal, Ngculu said it was done “entirely on commercial grounds”. He said UraMin persuaded Areva that it had a “moral obligation” to sign the deal Great Karoo had made in principle with UraMin.

UraMin had offered Great Karoo Metals a cash-and-shares deal worth “between $43.5-million and $47.5-million”, Ngculu said, whereas Areva – having bought UraMin – had no interest in shares and so “insisted that the transaction be settled in cash”.

“Given that the UraMin share price had risen since the original transaction was agreed to between Great Karoo and UraMin [an increase of about 50%], the final price agreed was $50-million.

“The price was based ultimately on the market value of uranium exploration and producing companies at the time,” Ngculu said.

Despite requests to both Ngculu and Tefo Maloisane (in his capacity as an Areva representative), the MG could not access full records of Great Karoo’s shareholding.

Julian Williams, Ngculu’s partner and co-founder and partner in private equity firm Basileus – a successor to the private equity firm that held 35.75% in Great Karoo – was shot dead in his Cape Town office last week in an altercation with an investor. It appears the dispute was based on the fate of investors’ funds in another company in which Basileus had an interest, Avalloy, which benefited from Mbeki administration arms-deal offsets through investment by British aero-engine manufacturer Rolls Royce.    

The new exhibition is a collaboration between Maropeng and the Bernard Price Institute (BPI) for Palaeontological Research at Wits University, to celebrate the university’s 90th anniversary.

The fossils on display, which offer an extraordinary glimpse into what came before dinosaurs, are a small selection of pieces from the institute’s prized original fossil collection.

At a glance the items on display might look like nothing more than pieces of rock, but a closer inspection reveals that they are palaeontological finds with great significance.

These fossils are helping scientists piece together the puzzle of human and mammal evolution.

Speaking at the opening of the exhibition, BPI director Prof Bruce Rubidge explained that the fossils on show reveal important information about the development of mammal-like reptiles, which over hundreds of millions of years gradually evolved into mammals.

“All fossils displayed here are our ancestors,” says Rubidge.

What scientists saw in their study of these fossils is that over time our primitive reptilian ancestors gradually acquired more mammal-like features. “This means we can trace the entire evolutionary development of mammals,” he explains.

Rubidge explains that about 300-million years ago, when terrestrial ecosystems started to develop, the only animals with backbones were fish and amphibians.

The Karoo region records a long period of geological ancestry of three groups of reptiles that gave rise to tortoises, dinosaurs, lizards, snakes and small mammals. “This whole evolution is encapsulated in these rocks in the Karoo,” he says.

SA’s rich fossil heritage

This collection of fossils is even more noteworthy because of its origins in rocks in the Karoo region, dating back 180- to 300-million years ago.

“What is amazing about South Africa’s Karoo rock is that it is an almost continuous sedimentary record of palaeontological history for a period of 120-million years,” explains Rubidge.

“It is the only place in the world with such an extensive and continuous record.”

What’s on show?

Visitors can see parts of Aardonyx, a vegetarian dinosaur from the early Jurassic period. This fossil, approximately 195-million years old and estimated to be seven metres long, has helped scientists to learn more about how early dinosaurs walked.

According to Dr Adam Yates, the primary investigator and a palaeontologist at the BPI, this particular species is important as it was close to the common ancestor of the gigantic sauropod dinosaurs.

Sauropods, also known as brontosaurs, were the largest backboned animals to walk on land with their long necks, tree-trunk legs and whip-like tails. Aardonyx probably walked on its hind legs, but could also drop onto all fours.

There is a large crocodile-like reptile skull, Erythrosuchus, believed to be one of the most distant ancestors of dinosaurs.

The large hand of a Gorgonopsian clearly illustrates the hunting capabilities of these flesh-eating mammal-like reptiles.

The showpiece of the collection is the 195-million-year-old clutch of dinosaur eggs – the oldest fossilised dinosaur eggs in the world, discovered in a cliff at the Golden Gate Highlands National Park in the Free State province.

This site previously yielded the oldest known embryos belonging to Massospondylus, a relative of sauropods.

The discovery of the clutch of eggs, which made international headlines, revealed important clues about the evolution of complex reproductive behaviour in early dinosaurs.

Speaking about this discovery in an earlier news report David Evans, curator of Vertebrate Palaeontology at the Royal Ontario Museum, said even though the fossil record of dinosaurs is extensive, there is very little information about their reproductive biology, particularly for early dinosaurs.

The newly-discovered dinosaur nesting ground is believed to be more than 100-million years older than previously known nesting sites.

At least ten nests have been discovered at several levels at the Golden Gate site, each with up to 34 round eggs in tightly clustered clutches.

The distribution of the nests in the rock indicates show that early dinosaurs returned repeatedly to this site, a process known as nesting site fidelity.

A palaeotourism route for SA

The fossils found in Karoo rock add to the country’s already extraordinary fossil record. “South Africa has had an enormous impact on the field of palaeontology,” Rubidge says.

He says there is great potential to develop a palaeotourism route in South Africa, and that there’s no reason why such an initiative couldn’t be as successful as the country’s wine route. South Africa has one of the richest fossil records and collections in the world and the industry could create many jobs.

Sites to include on the route include the Cradle of Humankind, where the 2.3-million year-old fossil Australopithecus africanus, known as Mrs Ples, was found in 1947; Nieu-Bethesda’s Kitching Fossil Exploration Centre, famous for its early dinosaur and reptile discoveries; Golden Gate, the site of the oldest fossilised dinosaur eggs in the world, and Langebaan on the West Coast, where fossilised human footprints dating back 117 000 years were found, the oldest known footprints of an anatomically-modern human.

Langebaan is home to the West Coast Fossil Park, about 150km northwest of Cape Town, where the oldest woodpecker in Africa was recently discovered and named after former president Nelson Mandela. It lived during the Pliocene era, which extended from about 5.3-million years to 2.6-million years ago.

The park contains many well-preserved examples of animals that roamed the land about five million years ago and is described as possibly the most diverse collection of fossils of that age.

? The fossil display will run until the end of October 2012.

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Anti-fracking campaigners are preparing for a legal wrangle with the government, as time ticks on towards the scheduled announcement of the Karoo fracking report, expected in August.

The Treasure Karoo Action Group (TKAG) has set up a legal team to re-focus its legal strategy in preparation for an all-out confrontation to prevent fracking in the Karoo.

The lobby group’s chairman Jonathan Deal said Cabinet was expected to make a decision in August on whether to lift the existing moratorium and allow exploratory drilling.

“We have engaged the well-established (legal) firm of Cullinan Associates, who will bring fresh thinking and decades of experience to our approach at this critical time in our campaign,” said Deal.

“We have been preparing for the moratorium to be lifted for a long time. We have selected the best legal minds that we can get to assist us to take this matter to the Constitutional Court, if need be,” he said.

Last year, the mineral resources department imposed a moratorium on fracking with the aim of implementing a study into the environmental impact of the controversial issue of drilling for shale gas in the Karoo — a process known as hydraulic fracturing, or fracking.

Mining Minister Susan Shabangu announced last August that the moratorium on prospecting for shale gas had been extended.

At the time, she said her department had to “engage with the public” on the contentious matter and, therefore, the extension of the moratorium was necessary.

Deal said the activists’ fears about the awarding of fracking licences were awakened by statements made by Energy Minister Dipuo Peters during a recent departmental meeting.

According to Deal, the minister said: “It would be wrong for us to not use the resources that God left us with. This is a blessing that God gives us, and we need to exploit [it] for the benefit of the people.”

She said the people of the Karoo were “going hungry”.

“In the run-up to the decision by government we are re-focusing our efforts to present a high-powered, well prepared legal campaign which we believe will halt the minister in her tracks,” Deal said in a statement.

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The shout-out is for the world’s most powerful radio telescope, the Square Kilometre Array, to be built 80 kilometres (50 miles) from Carnarvon along a dirt road that winds through scrubby, dry farmland into isolation.

The project is still years away. But its young neighbours are being groomed as enthusiasts – and even potential future staff – in a town where more than half of the 5,900 residents are jobless and welfare grants are a lifeline.

“We’re trying to excite them, show them that maths is easy, science is easy, so that eventually they could take up a bursary with us and become professional astronomers or engineers,” said SKA South Africa outreach leader Daphne Lekgwathi.

In a welcome coup for the world’s poorest continent, South Africa will host the bulk of the mega-telescope project, which is co-hosted by Australia.

The multi-nation project has been dubbed a “discovery machine” that will investigate the Big Bang, peek at black holes and uncover new frontiers – possibly even life beyond Earth – by peering further into the Universe than ever before.

Yet Africa’s biggest economy has a dismal science and maths track record in a schools system that still struggles with basic literacy 18 years into multi-racial democracy.

A survey released last year found that primary school maths teachers battled to do simple tasks such as calculating percentages, with half equating the difference between 60 and 75 centimetres as a 15 percent increase.

More than half of the 2011 school leavers who studied mathematics failed their year-end finals and only a third of science pupils scored higher than 40 percent.

The buzz over the telescope is seen as an unrivalled opportunity to inspire a turnaround.

“The SKA will be the biggest project of this century, and the amount of human resources required to analyse these data and make new discoveries is huge,” said operations and commissioning scientist Nadeem Oozeer.

“We need youngsters to keep on the work we shall be starting and pass on this passion for science and astronomy to another generation. This is also for the survival of science.”

The project is recruiting staff from engineers to senior astronomers, while its funding stretches from research chairs and artisanal training to offering bursaries to more than 400 students so far.

“The SKA will be one of the most exciting experiments I think in this century, so to be included and to see how it functions and is evolving is a great honour,” said Sudanese doctoral student Sahba Yahya, a bursary recipient doing a stint on-site.

“Usually people go from Africa to study in Europe. I think in 10 years, people will come to Africa to study astronomy.”

The SKA technology is still being designed and the installation will not be fully operational until 2024, for a total investment of 15 billion rand (1.5 billion euros, $1.8 billion).

Cutting-edge instrument for astronomy

The first phase will include the construction of South Africa’s 64-dish MeerKAT telescope, which will be the southern hemisphere’s most sensitive. It has already drawn hundreds of requests from scientists around the world to book time on it.

“It’s no longer a brain drain. The top scientists in the world want to come to South Africa to work on the project,” said chief operator Rupert Spann at the site in the central arid Karoo region.

Eventually 80 percent of 3,000 mid-frequency dishes installed in Africa will be scattered in the stark landscape, linking up with low-frequency antenna in Australia and New Zealand, to become the world’s biggest super-eye.

The amount of data it will collect in one day would need nearly two million years to play back on an iPod.

“This is the cutting-edge instrument for astronomy,” Spann told AFP. “It’s going to clarify a lot of theories on cosmology. It’s going to allow us to see the functioning of galaxies which we’ve never been able to see before. We don’t know what we’re going to find, but we know we’re going to find something.”

Grooming Africa’s future scientists is no easy task though.

Unlike the primary school’s cheerleader-like exuberance, a Carnarvon High School outreach event during school holidays attracted only one scholar apart from the science teacher’s son.

“They have that fear for maths and science. That’s basically the main problem,” science teacher Johannes Hoff told AFP as dozens of SKA-funded university students waited to demonstrate the assembly of an ordinary radio.

The project staff admit that realising their ambitions is a challenge.

But Oozeer says he is seeing small changes, content that students remember last year’s experiment of how to skewer a balloon without causing a bang, and that parents were increasingly involved.

The one high schooler who had surprised his teachers by volunteering to attend the special event appears to have caught the science bug. He now wants to be an engineer.

“I feel the change has started already. It will take time to reach full throttle, but once there, we will be flooded by young experts,” Oozeer said.

“It is the youngsters who will eventually change this poor track record.”

–AFP