MUSINA – LESSONS under the trees will be a thing of the past at the Musina-based Renaissance High School thanks to Coal of Africa Limited (Coal) who handed over four fully-furnished classrooms worth R6-million last Friday.
Since Coal adopted the school in 2012, a lot has been done to improve the learning conditions, including electrifying the whole school, air-conditioning, construction of steel fencing, provision of printing equipment and the deployment of 24-hour security services.
Addressing the people on behalf of Coal, Cobus Bronn said it was the responsibility of his company to make sure that communities near the mine benefited from the mining activities. He said it was encouraging to note that during the construction of the four classrooms, 27 unemployed locals were empowered through job opportunities.
“Besides improving the learning conditions, Coal successfully transferred skills to local communities who will be able to create jobs for themselves and become employers. As part of our social labour plans, we will continue to give support to different stakeholders to make sure that we contribute in developing the areas in which we operate,” he said.
Education acting MEC, Jerry Ndou, commended Coal for supplementing government’s efforts of infrastructure development in schools. “Although school infrastructure is a challenge across our province, we are happy to note that we have partners who are prepared to contribute to resolve this challenge. It is very important to invest in the education of our children because they are the future leaders of our country. We hope other companies will learn from Coal that it is important to support government to bring a better life for all,” he said.
Musina mayor, Mihloti Ramoyada said legislation such as the Mineral and Petroleum Resources Development Act had established targets against which mining companies should measure their performance on the social development of surrounding and labour-sending communities. “I’m happy to pronounce that Coal is making good progress towards achieving these goals,” she said.
School principal, Mashudu Sithole, thanked Coal for their gesture to improve learning conditions at the school.
