Over the next 16 and August 17 various corporations operating in several areas in southern Africa, especially the mining sector, will be brought to "trial" for violation of human rights and environmental damage in the Permanent Peoples' Tribunal on Transnational Corporations . The court held in Manzini, Swaziland, in the sphere of community people from summit to the Southern African Development Community (SADC) which takes place in parallel to the annual summit of Heads of State and governments in the region.
Mining Vale (Brazil) and Jindal (India), both coal extractors in Tete province, central Mozambique, are multinationals operating in the country that will be judged in this court. As far as it was found, the famous agricultural development program for the Nacala corridor, the controversial ProSavana, was for the next session of this court due to still be to produce evidence of their potential operationalization harmful for populations of the corridor of Nacala Area as well as for the environment.
The accused for ProSavana case would allegedly this research and experimentation stage, governments of Mozambique, Brazil and Japan and the driving agencies representing them.
At a time when the business of the el dorado Tete coal has little echoed in media channels and the dominant debates in Mozambique - as used usually happen when the boom announcement that mineral resource and beyond - this is the Environmental Justice / Friends Earth Mozambique, a persistent environmental organization in reporting cases of environmental destruction and human rights, has a charge and leads to Swaziland Vale and Jindal as "defendants".
In the case of Jindal, operations started up before the approval of the environmental impact study to affect more than 500 families in Cassoca communities, Luane, Cassica, Dzindza and Gulu, some of which live in the mine concession area and subject the inhumane living conditions. The same happened with Vale - fourth largest mining corporation of coal in the world - because it forced resettlement of 716 peasant families of Chipanga communities Malabwe and Mithete in Cateme resettlement center, which face extreme difficulties, since most of the the settlement lands are hardly conducive to agricultural practice. According to the Environmental Justice, various protests and denunciations of those communities affected by the actions of Vale were answered with violence and repression by the police of the Republic of Mozambique and the company.
It is recalled that in 2012, the giant Vale received an inglorious title of worst company in the world to have a "70-year history tarnished by repeated human rights abuses, inhumane working conditions, public property from looting and the ruthless exploitation of nature ", promoted a popular vote and created since 2000 by the NGOs Greenpeace and the Public Eye People's. This award is also known as the "Oscar of Shame."
The plaintiffs of the permanent court of people, mostly activists, social movements and civil society in the SADC countries, selected cases and corporations accused depending on the seriousness in which they explore the destinies of people, destroy natural heritage, violate human rights , dismantle public services, destroy the commons, encourage violence and threaten the food sovereignty of the peoples of the places in which they operate.
Other cases and corporations to be "judged" in Swaziland are Amadiba Crisis Committee and Mineal Commodities in Eastern Cape, South Africa; Glencore Coal Mpumalanga, South Africa; the Mopani Copper Mines in Zambia; Russian state DTZ-OZGEO in Zimbabwe, The Anthracite Coal Mines and mines in Somkhele and Fulene in Kwazulu Natla, South Africa; the Maloma Colliery, owned by Chancellor House and the Swazi government in Swaziland and Parmalat South Africa.
This court is part of the Global Campaign for Popular Sovereignty, dismantling corporate power and the end of impunity. The court join people affected by multinationals operating in Southern African countries in order to make visible its visible problems, analyze them, exchange experiences and coping methodologies and strengthen the struggle and mobilization together.
A second of the peoples court session will take place in May 2017.
