Marikana: a view from the mountain and a case to case to answer

by Peter Alexander, Thapelo Lekgowa, Botsang Mmope, Luke Sinwell and Bongani Xeswi.

Book launches. Johannesburg. Thursday 6 December, Council Chamber, University of Johannesburg Kingsway Campus. Prof. Adam Habib will facilitate discussion. Cape Town. Monday 10 December. Book Lounge, 71 Roeland Street (cnr Buitenkant Street). Prof. Martin Legassick will be the discussant. Both events are at 17.30 for 18.00.

This is the first book on the massacre. Its core is a series interviews with the event’s victims, Marikana’s striking miners. Many of these discussions were conducted on the side of the ‘mountain’ where 34 of the workers’ comrades were massacred by the police. There is also a narrative that links preceding events, thus making sense of the atrocity from the workers’ perspective; an analysis that focuses attention on the ‘triangle of torment’ (the police, the employer and the union); and a conclusion which highlights the courage of the Marikana miners and underlines the significance of this for labour relations and South African politics.

Go to the Jacana web site for special offer on advance purchases. A UK edition published Bookmarks is on the way.

‘A moment in South African history that… may come to be seen as having been as significant as “Sharpeville” and “Soweto”… well written, extremely scrupulous in its research and forceful in its argument.’ Prof. John Saul Professor Emeritus of Politics at York University, Toronto.

‘The book is an attempt to provide a bottom-up account of the Marikana story, to correct an imbalance in many official andmedia accounts that privilege the viewpoints of governments and business, at the expense of workers.’ Prof. JaneDuncan Highway African Chair of Media and Information Society, Rhodes University, Grahamstown, South Africa.

‘No amount of capitalist brutality will deter our cause for a living wage. Workers should read this book about the struggle at Marikana.’ Joseph Mathunjwa President, Association of Mineworkers and Construction Union.