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11 August, 2005ICEM News release No. 81/2001
Asbestos multinational Cape plc should settle immediately, out of court, with the victims of the company's operations in South Africa during the apartheid era.
So says the 20-million-strong International Federation of Chemical, Energy, Mine and General Workers' Unions (ICEM) in letters to Cape's four main shareholders.
Cape and its shareholders should "offer a just and equitable settlement to the claimants now," ICEM General Secretary Fred Higgs urges in the letters to Rutland Trust plc, Montpellier Group plc, Fidelity Investment International and M & G Investment Management. Like Cape itself, these four big shareholders are based in England.
Cape took full advantage of the apartheid system to exploit thousands of workers at its asbestos mines and mills in South Africa, Higgs writes. "Children were employed, unprotected, in the most hazardous tasks of sorting asbestos with their bare hands and trampling it with their bare feet. Due to the atrocious conditions at the mines and mills, thousands of South Africans developed the fatal asbestos cancer, mesothelioma, and the debilitating disease of asbestosis."
Cape closed its British asbestos factory in 1968, due to the high incidence of asbestos-related diseases. But it kept its South African operation running for another decade after that, and lobbied the apartheid regime to suppress information about the health risks.
While Cape has paid compensation to British former asbestos workers, no similar provision has been made for the South African victims. After protracted legal wrangling, the South Africans eventually won the right to pursue their claim through the English courts, and the case is now scheduled for trial in April 2002.
However, that will be too late for many of the South African victims. Since the legal action started, more than 300 of them have died. Many others are seriously ill.
So says the 20-million-strong International Federation of Chemical, Energy, Mine and General Workers' Unions (ICEM) in letters to Cape's four main shareholders.
Cape and its shareholders should "offer a just and equitable settlement to the claimants now," ICEM General Secretary Fred Higgs urges in the letters to Rutland Trust plc, Montpellier Group plc, Fidelity Investment International and M & G Investment Management. Like Cape itself, these four big shareholders are based in England.
Cape took full advantage of the apartheid system to exploit thousands of workers at its asbestos mines and mills in South Africa, Higgs writes. "Children were employed, unprotected, in the most hazardous tasks of sorting asbestos with their bare hands and trampling it with their bare feet. Due to the atrocious conditions at the mines and mills, thousands of South Africans developed the fatal asbestos cancer, mesothelioma, and the debilitating disease of asbestosis."
Cape closed its British asbestos factory in 1968, due to the high incidence of asbestos-related diseases. But it kept its South African operation running for another decade after that, and lobbied the apartheid regime to suppress information about the health risks.
While Cape has paid compensation to British former asbestos workers, no similar provision has been made for the South African victims. After protracted legal wrangling, the South Africans eventually won the right to pursue their claim through the English courts, and the case is now scheduled for trial in April 2002.
However, that will be too late for many of the South African victims. Since the legal action started, more than 300 of them have died. Many others are seriously ill.