ACTIVISTS staged a protest outside the South African embassy today to demand the country’s government take action against a “neocolonial” mining plan on its eastern coast.

Campaigners from the Marikana Solidarity Collective, Decolonising Environmentalism, War on Want and others demonstrated to highlight the struggle of the Amadiba community against a project to destroy the Xolobeni sands.

The community have been fighting the attempts of MRC, an Australian industrial company, from carrying out a large-scale dredging project to extract titanium from the sea bed.

Campaigners have pointed out that very little titanium is expected to be found and the environmental impact is likely to be massively damaging.

After a tough legal battle, the Pretoria High Court ruled in November that the Xolobeni area may be allowed to run by customary laws.

This means that communities in the area should be treated like protected indigenous groups and have the right to reject the proposed mining project.

The protesters are now pressuring the South African government to uphold the rulings of the court.

They are also demanding government minister Gwede Mantashe cancel his upcoming scheduled visit to the Xolobeni sands, which protesters claim is an attempt to undermine the community’s rejection of the mining plans.

Andy Higginbottom, from the Marikana Solidarity Collective, told the Star: “What is going on is like the return of a colonial type of relationship.

“Nothing has changed too much if multinational corporations can still behave like this in Africa.”

The campaigners delivered a letter to the embassy raising their concerns.