There is currently a paper being drafted which is believed will be for international distribution. The paper alleges that, with reference to the Wonderfonteinspruit Catchment, NGOs are active for the very first time in the history of mine water management in South Africa.
Further the claim is made that NGOs have the capacity to create policy coalitions by being policy entrepreneurs with sufficient credibility to counter the policy monopoly that had been so deeply entrenched after a century of extraction.
The Regulatory Forum’s establishment on the 21st of December in which all the regulatory authorities (NNR, DWAF, DME, DEAT) were engaged, is asserted to have flowed from this NGO activity – a first in the history of these regulatory bodies.