Loaded for Bear: Mantashe's mining cadastre is rolling out at a geological pace
It has been music to the ears of South Africa's (SA's) mining sector, but in hindsight, only the tone-deaf would have fallen for the melody.
For months, Minerals and Petroleum Minister Gwede Mantashe promised that the long-awaited mining cadastre – desperately needed to address an applications backlog and bring transparency to the permitting process – would be up and running by June.
'The completion of the migration process to the new efficient and transparent mining licensing system, in June next year, is poised to modernise our licensing system, ensure regulatory certainty, and the sustainability of the South African mining industry,' Mantashe told the Joburg Mining Indaba in October last year.
The lack of a proper cadastre – an online portal that displays a country's mineral wealth while allowing companies to seamlessly apply for mining and prospecting rights – has long been a deterrent to mining investment, leading to massive applications backlogs and suspicions of corruption at regional offices of the Department of Mineral and Petroleum Resources (DMPR).
This shambles is especially harmful to prospecting – a high-risk activity – and is a key reason why SA's share of global exploration spend has fallen to under 1% from 5% two decades ago.
Mantashe and other officials in the department for months this year stuck to the June timeline, a prospect that admittedly needed to be seen to be believed, after years of bungling and needless delays on this front.
And in late May, lo and behold, there was an adjustment to this timeline – the first flashing red light signalling that the rollout was hitting some potholes.
Tseliso Maqubela, a deputy director-general in the DMPR, told the Junior Mining Indaba that the department was 'on track to deliver a transparent cadastral system' but it would not go live everywhere initially, with the Western Cape chosen as the province to test drive the new system.
And last week – surprise, surprise! – Mantashe told Parliament that the Western Cape launch had been delayed by another three months, reported in Mining Weekly.
'… this is a delicate process that requires precision and quality assurance, and it is taking longer than we had anticipated. Consequently, this has resulted in a need to reschedule the phased rollout of the system in the Western Cape by a further three months,' Mantashe said.
Everything at the DMPR – formerly the DMRE – seems to take 'longer than anticipated', which speaks volumes to its many governance failures and points to entrenched interests wary of the light of transparency being directed to the applications and permitting process.
The Mpumalanga regional office is a standout in this regard. It accounts for the bulk of the applications backlog, a suspicious state of affairs linked to a dubious scramble for mining permits for coal. Mining permits only cover up to five hectares of land and have far fewer regulatory and environmental requirements than mining rights.
Then there was the pledge to publish quarterly updates on the applications bottleneck, and the progress made in whittling it down. An update was published in November last year.
But there has been nothing since – unless it is buried somewhere on the department's website, which would also go against the grain of transparency. Mantashe did tell Parliament last week that 2,596 applications were approved in the previous financial year.
The cadastre provider – PMG consortium – was selected in January last year and is spear-headed by Canadian-based Geotech, which is widely seen as first-class in the field.
But the bottom line is that the Western Cape launch has now been moved out to the end of September, leaving the industry wondering when the system will be up and running nationwide.
And given the department's track record, it will come as no surprise if that timeline is missed as well.
The cadastre rollout is going at a geological pace, and meanwhile the mining sector still has to contend with the utterly useless Samrad system for processing mining and exploration applications. New coal deposits might form before the new cadastre goes live. DM
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