There is Still Time for Anglo American to Come Home: A Vision for Mining’s Critical Future
8 October 2025
Earlier this year, South Africa’s government released its most ambitious mining blueprint in decades, namely the Critical Minerals and Metals Strategy, a plan to turn our nation into a global powerhouse for the minerals that will drive the next industrial age.
It was a statement of hope and hard intent to transform South Africa into a leader in platinum, manganese, iron ore, coal, and chrome. This ambitious strategy would transform the age-old story of South Africa being simply an exporter of raw materials, to a nation that proudly shapes the world’s clean-energy transition.
And yet, at this very moment of renewal, Anglo American — the company that once embodied South Africa’s industrial soul — is walking away.
Its recent divestments tell a troubling story: platinum holdings reduced, De Beers handed over to Botswana, and even manganese, which is a mineral declared “highly critical” by government, is marked for exit.
This follows Anglo’s Canadian expansion, where CAD$4.5 billion has been earmarked for growth and community investment in Canada, while South Africa received nothing comparable.
The irony is stark an insolent because at the very moment South Africa seeks to rebuild its mining future, Anglo as the country’s founding corporate partner seems intent on closing the chapter that began here.
The Cost of Missed Commitments
Anglo’s withdrawal is a business decision that undermines a century of partnership that built towns, schools, and generations of skilled labour, and still owes many communities much of their promises.
The decline is measurable in hard numbers: South Africa’s royalties and taxes from Anglo have dropped from $4 billion in 2021 to under $900 million by 2024, alongside falling wage and benefit contributions.
The heart of South Africa’s mining economy was once loud and proud but now Anglo even fails to meet the imperatives of the Critical Minerals Strategy. This weakens South Africa’s development goals, and it diminishes Anglo American’s own long-term relevance. We know that the new economy is rightly guided by ESG and that success will belong to companies that fuse their profit with community partnership and earned trust.
Lives Lost in the Balance
But numbers alone cannot tell this story and beyond the balance sheets there is a human ledger where over the past five years, eight South Africans have died at Anglo American sites. This represents two-thirds of all fatalities across the company worldwide.
2020 [Anglo American, Integrated Annual Report 2020, page 46]
- Jabulane Nkambule – Zibulo colliery
- Lindile Manzingi – Dishaba mine
2021 [Anglo American, Integrated Annual Report 2022, page 58]
- Julian Seinyi – PGM’s Anglo Converter Plant (ACP)
2022 [Anglo American, Integrated Annual Report 2022, page 58]
- Phasoana Rheina Malatji – Modikwa mine
2023 [Anglo American, Integrated Annual Report 2023, page 68]
- Nico Molwagae – Kolomela iron ore mine
2024 [Anglo American, Integrated Annual Report 2024, page 31]
- Tshepiso Terrence Mokale – Dishaba mine
- Euzmen Ndlebe – Dishaba mine
- Basanda Glen Langeni – Dishaba mine
More than just statistics in a report, they are fathers, sons, brothers, and colleagues who went to work so that this nation could build, and trade, and contribute to the life and survival of communities. Each life lost underground exposes the painful gap between Anglo’s global ambition and local accountability. This is the reality of sacrifice.
So, as Anglo divests from South Africa, it leaves behind unrehabilitated mines, unhealed communities and broken promises.
There Can Be Redemption
Here lies the unfinished narrative of Anglo’s legacy, one that only their CEO, Mr Duncan Wanblad, can balance.
He has the rare chance to turn corporate guilt into a renewal for society, and to show the world that big power and sincere compassion can exist together in one hand. Yes, the CEO carries the weight of restructuring failures, but he also has an opportunity to carry the courage to honour our fallen sisters and brothers by investing in the living, here at home.
That could mean any number of meaningful interventions like partnering with communities to establish a National Mine Safety and Skills Summit in Johannesburg, not London or Toronto, so that the lessons from our soil can guide the world and educate children everywhere.
The Future is Still In the Making
Here in South Africa, we are good at seeing the bright side of life and we are good at making a plan, that is why so many of us from mining communities around the country believe that Anglo American is simply at a crossroads. They have deep roots in Johannesburg, a solid reach in London, and now a proposed presence in Canada, therefore the company can lead from a triple-home base that brings together continents with the future of mining, through accountability.
South Africans do not resent Canada’s progress, in fact we celebrate it, we want to learn from it and most importantly we want the same. We also want apprenticeship programmes, clean-water systems, and local beneficiation plants that turn our minerals into finished products here, at home.
Johannesburg as the hub of skills, research, and AI-driven innovation for safe and socially conscious mining. London as a centre that aligns shareholder value with environmental and social justice. And Canada as a model for green mining and community partnership. All sharing best practices with Africa through equitable and inclusive collaboration.
If done right, Anglo can restore it legacy as a bridge between nations and peoples, amidst a complex history that leaves us with little hope..
A Lifeline
So, to the comrades and colleagues of Mr Wanblad, we see this difficult time in our country’s mining sector as an invitation to remember that the measure of greatness lies not in what we take from the earth, but in what we give back to it.
South Africa remains your home. The children, women and men in the communities that Anglo leaves behind, will always remain your people.
Maybe you can find it in your heart and your leadership to remember that our story began here, long before foreign mergers, so that we can all prove that the story of this nation still believes in the power of mining to build and to prosper.
And there is still time for Anglo American and for Mr Duncan Wanblad to remember where its heart began.
by The Tlou Mogale Foundation — independent coalition for mining accountability in South Africa