Pinpointing Pollution (Part 2): Living and dying in Thubelihle

Daily Maverick

8 hours ago

In part 2 of Daily Maverick's mapping project on air pollution, we see and hear from community members in Thubelihle, Mpumalanga.
The air in Thubelihle is tinted with a yellow ochre haze as fine, pale dust from power stations and mines that settles on skin, homes and in lungs alike. And yet still, children play in the street.
In the first part of this investigation, Daily Maverick mapped the places where South Africans are most vulnerable to air pollution's deadly effects. Then we went to meet them.
This is what they said.
Sipho Maseko
'In my tenure, now as a councillor, I had two children die because they were affected by the ash. They were affected by the dust. Children died.'
So said Sipho Maseko, the ward councillor in Thubelihle, in conversation with Daily Maverick.
'I had a granny and maybe a person in her early 40s, I think I had four cases that were caused by the dust from the mines.'
Maseko has been in his position for only four years.
'Here in Kriel, there are two clinics. There are government clinics – one here in the township and one at town. Honestly, there should be more because there's also an extension of the township that is developing about 7,000 residential stands. So it obviously means that the number [population] is growing.'
Asked how many people called Thubelihle home, he said more than 20,000. 'So it's more than 20,000 people that are basically all at one clinic.'
He explained how the landscape affected employment and the environment.
'We're surrounded by mines. The longest distance is not more than five kilometres, so obviously there's blasting, mining activities around, air pollution like now recently, I think, if I'm not mistaken, on Friday, there was ash from Eskom, it was whitish, like from the towers. So the whole area, the whole Kriel, was white with the ash. It's not good.'
Pollution he attributed to the local mines was an everyday occurrence, but he said the wayward fly ash from Eskom's power station fell on the town in this dramatic fashion less frequently.
Asked about some of the main challenges in the community, he immediately identified air pollution.
He said he had engaged with the mines surrounding the community, and they would not take accountability.
'And the mines [management] say 'we are surrounded by mines' so no one wants to take accountability and so they say, 'just because we are the closest, but now mos you can see from the north, from the east, from the south there's ash everywhere, so how can you tell it's us that must take accountability?'
'So no one takes accountability … it becomes difficult,' said Maseko, explaining that the community is surrounded by heavy industries as well as the Eskom power stations, making it hard for any one actor to take accountability for emissions and impact on the community.
Asked about evidence linking pollution to the deaths he mentioned, Maseko said that he had seen the cause of death reports and death certificates that detailed severe respiratory and cardiovascular diseases.
'Doctor's report, post-mortem, from the hospital and once you go to the family, they tell you the cause of death is air pollution.'
Maseko continued , 'The challenge that we are having, it was going to be better to know, yes, this ash is killing us, but [at least] we are benefiting. So that's the number one thing that is very much worrying. You know, you keep on having protests now and then because we are living here, but we are not benefiting, we are dying from this ash.'
'No one is working in the mines, no one is working at Eskom. It's a better cry if you hear from the families saying, 'I'm from the mine, maybe I'm producing that which has killed my child,' but it's none. They don't benefit.'
Just a week before Daily Maverick spoke to community members, they were protesting against the levels of pollution and the alleged lack of action to address it.
'Now we hear there is a new mine opening. Fine, we need jobs, so we are happy, but you'll hear 70% [of people hired are] from outside, 30% from local. It doesn't make sense. People who are benefiting don't reside here.'
Chief Tony 'Boy' Mahlangu
Daily Maverick also spoke to community leader Chief Tony 'Boy' Mahlangu.
'I grew up in this area. Since I was born basically in this area, we've been staying close to these power stations. We grew up with this asthma thing, these things [Matla and Kriel Power Stations] are causing asthma. So if you go around to the doctors and check, most of the kids have got asthma.'
'That's why also us, we've got it [asthma]. The air is not clean. The air is not clean,' said Mahlangu, adding that 'you can even see the small particles. Even on the car there on the window,' he said, pointing to a car parked by the community centre.
'They call it a flying ash, so this thing is very dangerous. There are a lot of deaths around this area regarding this thing. '
'A lot of people staying around, they're coughing a lot, they have asthma, all those things. And once we had a meeting with Eskom at Megawatt Park… especially Kriel, because they said they are not reaching it, pollution targets, whatever they call it.'
'The saddest part, the really saddest part about this is that you cannot be killed by something in your area and then most of the people are not benefiting from that thing,' said Mahlangu, adding that 'now we are here and I, as a chief, I can't say there's anything that we're benefiting from those two power stations. It's like a middle finger.'
Richard Tshabala
Richard Tshabalala is a community leader from Ward 25 and a founder of Liberated Community Structures (LCS), based in Thubelihle.
He told Daily Maverick that 'the challenge that we are having here is air pollution. We've been complaining about this problem. We even wrote to the Department of Environment about this issue.
'There was a lady I was working with, she was a ward committee [member] and she suffered from asthma, she even passed on from this problem. We've been complaining, complaining [to] management of Eskom. We even escalated the matter to Megawatt [Park], but no one cares. No one cares.
'These days it's worse. If you can come in the morning here, it's worse. It looks like a mist if you don't know it, but if you come closer, it's air pollution. And it's affecting the children, small children, its affecting the whole community. So we are very worried about the health of our community.'
Just like others before him, Tshabalala complained that he and other community members suffered from the negative impacts, but derived none of the benefits. This was a consistent theme throughout.
'And the problem is the other problem that we are having, we're not benefiting anything. The job opportunities, business opportunities, even the skill development. We're not benefiting. They don't care. They only employ people from outside. We've been complaining about this several times.'
'So we are worried about the future of our children, because these children are going to suffer from asthma. Even you can check here, we only have the one clinic,' he said, pointing to the sole clinic in the area.
He said that it used to operate for only half the day, but because of their efforts, it now operates for 24 hours a day. 'But it's not good enough, because we need a hospital. We need a hospital, and no one cares.'
'Even you can check the development. This place is not developed, but if we can check, we are surrounded by mines, we are surrounded by power stations, but no one is benefiting. That's the situation or the conditions that we are living under,' Tshabalala said.
Maggie Mahlangu
Former ward councillor and doting grandmother Maggie Mahlangu graciously invited Daily Maverick into her living room. Her 18-month-old granddaughter, Nokubonga Mashele, sat on her lap, constantly coughing during the interview as if to underscore the points being made by her grandmother.
'If you can see, this one [pointing to her granddaughter] is one year six months, and since she was born, always in the hospital, two weeks in the hospital, and she came back after three months in the hospital again, four times in the hospital. Her chest is too tight and she's coughing a lot.'
As she speaks, Nokubonga coughs with tragic regularity, her little body shuddering with every cough.
'Most of the children are coughing, and the pollution is not good. If you park a car, in the morning, the ash is on top of the cars: too much,' said Mahlangu.
'Either they have got sinuses or asthma, it's because of pollution,' she said while her granddaughter coughed repeatedly atop her lap. 'No one came here and asked, 'your children is sick or what?' but we face those challenges each and every time.'
Mahlangu said that during her time as a councillor, many people would come to her and complain about the air quality.
'We talk a lot about the pollution. Every time we talk about the air pollution, the community is angry. This pollution is destroying everything here and no one is working. It's a problem, it's a big, big problem.'
'The other lady who was in my ward committee died because of asthma in November 2021. That one was bad. Yoh yoh, that one was very bad because she used an oxygen mask. If she walks a short distance, breathing becomes a problem. We have lots of stories like that.'
'Even if you go to the clinic, there's a lot of children there. They're affected badly,' said Mahlangu.
Asked what should be done, she said, 'I don't know. Eskom is busy. They must come to the community. The problem is they didn't even come to the community and tell the community what are the causes of the sickness, asthma, sinuses and all those things. They just keep quiet like nothing happened, but if they can come and have a way to control the ash, it will be better. Just to come communicate with the community is better.'
Told about Eskom's presentation to Parliament and the cost of meeting minimum emission standards, Mahlangu's demeanour changed.
'If they cost billions, what about us?' she asked angrily.
'It's not going to happen. It's just talk because they see ministers and what what. It's not going to happen.'
'They must control that power station and the affected people, they must come to the affected people so that those people they must know, the communication is better than [if] you just keep quiet. If you come to the people and communicate with them, they will know what they must do, but if you keep quiet, you are saying all the people must die.'
'And it's painful to have a child like this one having a cough like this. This coughing is too bad.'
Xolane Mtsweni showed Daily Maverick the nebuliser that six-year-old Mpendulwenhle Mtsweni has to use. He struggles to get the medicine he needs, and if there is an emergency, help is hours away at best.
He says that Mpendulwenhle is dependent on the only clinic in the area, and in an emergency, they have to hope the neighbour's car is available because an ambulance can take up to two hours to fetch them.
'Each and every month we are going to hospital and it's all because of breathing and stuff,' said Sister Mtsweni, Mpendulwenhle's mother. He has had to make use of the nebuliser since the age of two.
Asked what should be done or how her situation could be improved, she said, 'They must help me with this, especially. There's a medication for this machine to work, and this medication is very expensive; they can buy me that medicine,' said Mtsweni.
The Thwalas
Outside their home, Patricia and Mduduzi Thwala spoke to Daily Maverick along with their two sons, Nqubeko and Isenathi.
'Isenathi has a problem with short breath and sinus. Nqubeko is coughing day and night. The problem is caused by the dust from the mines and the power stations,' the parents said, finishing each other's sentences.
'People are very sick, so we need help because even Eskom doesn't care about us. They don't even come and check what we are going through in this community. So we need help.'
Mduduzi said, 'When you're starting to identify these problems, when a child is starting to cough, you think it's a small thing and then we realised when we started to see, 'no this boy has a short breath'.
'I think if we can get a right platform where these issues can be addressed or reported, I think in that case maybe they can try to minimise or avoid such things; for example, when you look, there's a mine next to the road. I've never even seen one [manager] coming and saying, 'How do you feel about the dust?' We're experiencing dust and even houses are cracking from blasting.
'So there's no one from their management side who addressed people about such things. More especially, this issue of pollution, I think it's an [especially] bad thing in this location, in this community, is very bad.'
Patricia said that they might be unwell themselves, but they don't have the money to go to a doctor, so they ignore their symptoms.
Simphiwe Maseko
Simphiwe Maseko's 14-year-old daughter, Thando Nkosi, is not allowed to take part in sport.
'She doesn't play anything. She doesn't run. Once she starts running, she coughs. She doesn't participate in anything because we are scared; maybe if she can participate in sports, athletics and whatnot, she just comes back sick. So that's why we forbid her to take part.'
'She gets sick all the time. We go to the doctor more than two times a month, and it's difficult to get to the doctor from here. We do have a car, but sometimes my brother is using it, so I have to take the taxi. Sometimes I don't have money to go to town, so it becomes very difficult,' Maseko tells Daily Maverick.
'It's because of the mines, because a lot of people around here, they've either got asthma, they've got sinus problems, eye problems, allergies because of this air, because of these mines, and all the pollution is very bad.'
Asked what she would tell government leaders, leaders at Eskom and mine operators, she said simply, 'Can they please make sure that they recognise the people?
'A president is a president because of people, not because he wants to be there. We elected that person to be there. So the president must just take accountability, notice everything that the community or the people or the country are complaining about. We are complaining about the health [problems] that we are facing. We are complaining about a lot of things, especially the mines. Our lives are ruined.'
Daily Maverick has previously reported that in October 2024, the national air quality officer at the Department of Forestry, Fisheries and the Environment, Dr Patience Gwaze, said efforts were under way to enhance actions and improve the quality of air in the country through declared priority areas, metropolitan areas and air quality hotspots.
However, despite interventions undertaken since 2006, not much improvement has been achieved in the areas of concern. Gwaze said air pollution continued to be a leading national environmental human health risk.
Daily Maverick reached out to Gwaze and the department for comment. Our request was acknowledged but a response thereafter was not received.
Seriti Resources, one of the owners of a local mine, said in response to questions from Daily Maverick, 'We recognise the potential impacts that our operations can have on surrounding communities, and we are committed to minimising any negative effects while actively contributing towards a positive and sustainable future for all.
'We have invested significantly in a range of environmental management initiatives to reduce our footprint. These include advanced dust suppression technologies to limit airborne pollutants, comprehensive water management systems to ensure efficient and responsible use of water resources and continuous air quality monitoring to comply with strict environmental standards. We also ensure compliance to relevant legislation and environmental regulations.'
'We appreciate the concerns raised and remain open to constructive dialogue that helps us improve and better serve our communities.'
The story of Thubelihle is illuminating in that it tells the story of how a confluence of failures, pollution, non-responsiveness by authorities and generalised, ailing service delivery finds confluence in the coughs of a child and the death of a young woman.
Though Thubelihle may be one place on a map, there are many such communities across South Africa where the constitutional right to a healthy environment is trampled on and disregarded day in, day out.
And while politicians and ministers in Cabinet talk about the injustice of job losses in the coal value chain, they are conveniently deaf to the plight and pleas of the people in these communities who assert – in between harsh coughs and wheezes – that they don't feel that they benefit today and that there is no justice for them. DM