He made the statements during the council’s annual general meeting, which was held online. 

Mgojo said he believed that the industry had been implementing the standard operating procedure developed by the minerals council in consultation with the industry’s health experts, and the regulations developed by the department of mineral resources and energy.  

He also paid tribute to “the very helpful and business-like engagements over the past few months" with mineral resources minister Gwede Mantashe, saying the minister and his peers were having to balance economic survival with the health of citizens. 

Mgojo warned that while it was necessary to focus on the battle against Covid-19, “we cannot allow that obligation to reduce in any way our focus on the struggle to meet our better-known occupational health and safety (OHS) challenges”.

He further noted the marked improvement in OHS in 2019, saying fatality and injury rates were down, along with incidents of the most common occupational diseases.

However, Mgojo drew attention to the challenges facing the industry and country prior to the enforced reduction in economic activity from late March, due to the Covid-19 lockdown. 

He warned that Eskom’s financial challenges remained, and that its operational performance would be vulnerable once a more normal level of economic activity resumed.

“The new government was too slow in its first two years to get to grips with the structural changes that were, and are, needed. We now face a deep economic recession with reduced business activity, reduced employment and consequently, reduced state revenues, combined with the need for huge social and business support measures,” he said.

The consequences of Covid-19, and the successive rating agency downgrades, had made previously recommended economic restructuring measures even more urgent, he added.

“More than ever, these times demand co-operation, understanding and a united effort to rescue our industry, our country’s economy and our population’s overall health and welfare from the deepest crisis we and our world have seen in most of our living memory. We commit to doing our part in every sphere,” Mgojo said.

African News Agency (ANA)