Wasting the Nation.indd - Groundwork

Chapter 3: The politics of wastehave the capacity to deal with them. This was rather rich given South Africa’s own record– but perhaps DTI was simply oblivious to the catastrophe of waste management,much as it was and is oblivious to wastes generated from the industries it promotes.EJNF pointed out that waste traders were likely to use neighbouring countries as aconduit for importing wastes to South Africa. Indeed, the local industry’s continuedinterest in waste trading was soon confirmed when EnviroServ tendered to importNew York’s waste to Namibia and incinerate it. The project was abandoned when itmet with opposition from the Namibian public and then from its government. DTI,however, remains sympathetic to such proposals. Since that time, department officialshave periodically questioned why South Africa should not make money from tradingin waste, implying that waste is just another commodity.In 2000, a shipment of toxic mining waste from Australia to South Africa wasauthorised by both governments. The waste was destined for Mintek, the state ownedmineral research corporation which essentially aims to support the competitiveness ofthe minerals industry. Mintek said the waste was for research and what was left of itafter the research was done would be returned to Australia. According to BAN, this wasthe first time that the Basel ban was intentionally violated by two member countries.groundWork, then in its first year of operation, and Earthlife called on government toclarify its position on toxic waste imports, ratify the Basel ban amendment and jointhe Bamako Convention. Government ignored all three calls.Meanwhile, toxic trading scandals keep recurring. In 2006, transnational oil traderTrafigura tried to off-load a cargo of toxic waste, misrepresented as ‘slops’, in Amsterdam.On inspecting the waste, Amsterdam authorities found it that it was highly toxic oilsludge and said they would charge $300,000 for disposal. Trafigura refused the dealand the ship set sail to Abidjan in the Ivory Coast. There, it contracted a local companywhich dumped the waste at 18 different sites around the city. Over 10,000 people werepoisoned and at least 10 died. The Ivory Coast government commissioned a clean upand prosecuted some of the offenders including two Trafigura officials.In Somalia, sea pirates this year highlighted the fact that the toxic dumping initiatedin the early 1990s has never stopped. They demanded an $8 million ransom for acaptured arms trading ship to contribute to a clean up. After 20 years of dumping,said a pirate spokesperson, “The Somali coastline has been destroyed, and we believethis money is nothing compared to the devastation that we have seen on the seas.” TheUnited Nations Environment Programme confirms the pirates’ allegation. The 2004- 48 - groundWork - Wasting the Nation