SOUTH African mines minister, Gwede Mantashe, said he was hopeful that the mines placed into business rescue proceedings by the Gupta family would be resuscitated, according to a report by Fin24, an online publication.
“What heartened me was the fact that they [business rescue practitioners] explained to us that creditors and workers have been paid,” Mantashe told Parliament’s mineral resources portfolio committee. “All of the mines in the Tegeta Group are attending to the problems and [they] gave me the assurance that the operations can get back to a normal state of work,” he said.
Ten days have passed since eight mining companies under the Gupta-owned group of mining operations in South Africa started their business rescue process, following the exit of the Bank of Baroda from the country, which left the mines without banking facilities to pay employees and creditors, said Fin24.
Louis Klopper, business practitioner for the eight companies of the group under business rescue, told the committee that the sheer number of companies under the large group of mining operations made it difficult to hold board, staff and creditor meetings within 10 days, in line with business rescue requirements.
“In terms of the business rescue process, we are bound by chapter six that within 10 days we must have staff meetings and creditor meetings. But we are dealing with eight entities that are going into business rescue at the same time,” said Klopper.
