Lonmin must still build housing for more than 11,000 employees
Lonmin, the world’s third-largest platinum miner, has to build accommodation for 11,500 of its employees, but the weak platinum price is working against major housing investment, CEO Ben Magara said on Friday. Lonmin has 33,000 people working on its mines near Rustenburg, of which 25,000 are its employees. It has built accommodation for more than half of those, with 11,500 still "in need of decent accommodation," he said. Lonmin has converted its single-sex hostels and has built apartments near those hostels. It has also donated land to the government to build houses, he said. "We are 50% of the way there and the rest of our employees are living in areas where we feel they deserve better," Magara said at a media briefing. "But we need to be profitable." "We unfortunately cannot build as fast as we want to because the platinum price is not there," he said.
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