Sasol moves South African workers out of Mozambique amid attacks

By ANA MONTEIRO
Bloomberg

Sasol will send home South African nationals working on projects in Mozambique after citizens of the gas-rich nation protested their presence following attacks on foreigners in the continent’s second-biggest economy.

The world’s largest producer of motor fuel from coal will facilitate the phased, temporary exit of about 340 South Africans from Mozambique in a step that has halted project site work, Johannesburg-based Sasol said in a statement Friday. Operations at its central processing facility in Temane and the gas-fired power plant at Ressano Garcia are uninterrupted.

“Mozambican employees of our service providers have expressed concern around the reported incidents of violence against Mozambicans and other foreign nationals in South Africa and are also protesting about the presence of South African employees of our service providers working on the project,” Sasol said. The decision is “a precautionary measure,” it said.

At least five people have died in clashes in the eastern port city of Durban, Johannesburg and other towns since last week, while more than 1,400 have fled their homes. The violence is embarrassing for the ruling African National Congress, whose members sought refuge in countries such as Mozambique before white-minority rule ended in 1994.

Some poor South Africans see Somalis, Ethiopians, Malawians and Pakistanis as competitors for jobs and business opportunities in a country with a 24% unemployment rate and a fifth of the population of 54 million surviving on less than 335 rand ($28) a month.

President Jacob Zuma, who spent years in exile in Mozambique and Swaziland, appealed for calm in an interview with state television Wednesday and reiterated his call in an address to lawmakers Thursday.

Sasol sources gas from Mozambique’s Pande and Temane fields through a 865-kilometer (536-mile) pipeline to its synthetic- fuels plant in Secunda in South Africa and is studying further fields in adjacent concessions.

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