Residents of the South Durban Basin have vowed to protest at the premises of the Engen refinery on Wednesday to highlight fears and concerns regarding the planned conversion of the refinery into a fuel storage depot, and the lack of a “just transition” strategy which would ensure that workers and the community of south Durban have a sustainable and fair future.
Engen announced in April last year that it would shut its Durban refinery and convert the site into an import terminal and product storage facility by the end of next year.
Long-time South Durban resident and community activist Desmond D’Sa said that “Engen is one of the worst corporate citizens in South Africa – a mainly Malaysian-owned firm whose local Black Economic Empowerment tycoon Phuthuma Nhleko has consistently disempowered our black neighbourhoods”.
“Nhleko is also the main partner of the notorious French oil company Total in offshore gas drilling at Brulpadda and Luiperd, and not only does he apparently care nothing for the local pollution he and the Malaysians have heaped upon us. He also is hell-bent on increasing methane pollution from gas deposits, despite it being 85 times more potent a greenhouse gas than carbon dioxide."
D’sa recalled “with fury” several explosions, chemical leaks and noxious fumes released by the Engen refinery over the years with the December 2020 explosion proving to be the final nail in the coffin for the ailing plant. The extensive damage inflicted on refinery infrastructure proved too expensive to repair. A few months later, the refinery shut its doors.
At the time, Engen, in a media statement, said that “the refinery-to-terminal (RTT) repurposing initiative was based on a strategic evaluation, which confirmed the refinery was no longer financially viable and determined that the investments required to upgrade it in line with evolving fuel quality and emissions regulations would be unaffordable.”
Established in 1954, the Engen refinery was South Africa’s oldest and responsible for about 17% of the country’s fuel production according to Engineering Weekly. The refinery had an average capacity of 120 000 barrels per day and ranked as a low-capacity, medium-complexity facility with limited upgrading potential.
“Since 1998 when South Durban’s Strategic Environmental Assessment was conducted, Engen seemed to believe its future was to creep, crawl and thereby steal the land on which our Wentworth and Merebank communities are located.
“Recall that we were relocated from other areas of Durban, including Cato Manor, due to apartheid segregation policies. Engen heaps insult upon insult, making profits off of our suffering whether under racial apartheid or post-apartheid environmental injustice,” said D'sa.
“We as the South Durban Community Environmental Alliance (SDCEA) and South Durban communities stand together against the repurposing and oil-storage expansion of Engen, due to the increase we have for our health concerns, the massive increase in truck traffic that is anticipated, and the ongoing damage that such fossil fuels do to our planet,” he continued.
D’sa said that communities in the Durban South area are again under threat if the planned storage facility gets the go-ahead. “Just like our neighbours to the north in the Clairwood residential area were bombarded by heavy industry and trucking, we have heard that an increase in fuel storage at Engen could result in some 2 000 hazardous tankers on our residential roads in Merebank and Wentworth.”
According to D’sa, the community anticipates more fossil fuel disasters, leaks, and explosions, resulting in yet more cancers and breathing problems in Merebank, Wentworth, the Bluff, Treasure Beach and Lamontville.
The likely increase in hazardous oil tankers on our roads will affect the safety and peace of learners, educators, and workers coming in and going out of the area, as well as residents. “We have witnessed many truck accidents on our roads, with hundreds of trucks blocking community roads in this area due to Transnet’s freight ‘road to rail’ mismanagement,” D’sa said.
The protest will take place on Wednesday from 9:30 to 10:30 at the Engen Depot on Tara Road, south of Durban.
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