UPL bans Daily Maverick from Durban chemical fire community meeting – again

UPL did not physically eject this reporter from the meeting. They simply cancelled the show when they got wind that Daily Maverick was planning to attend and report on a meeting of the Cornubia Multi-Stakeholders Forum – an independent body appointed by the provincial government to represent and provide feedback to communities affected by the July 2021 arson attack on UPL’s Durban chemical storage warehouse.

Several thousand tonnes of pesticides, herbicides and other farm chemicals spilt uncontrolled into local rivers, soil and the sea after the fire, while thousands of Durban residents breathed in toxic fumes that spewed into the air for 11 days from the gutted warehouse.

In Durban, at least 3.5 tonnes of dead fish washed up in river estuaries or along the beachfront after toxic chemicals spilled from UPL’s warehouse in Cornubia in 2021. (Photo: Supplied)

The forum meeting (due to be held at UPL’s Umhlanga Ridge offices in Durban at 9.30am on 10 August) was abruptly called off less than half an hour before the scheduled start.

In an email message sent to forum members just after 9am, UPL environmental consultant Vicki King apologised for the short notice in cancelling the meeting.

“Unfortunately Tony Carnie was insisting on attending and this is not a press forum. We will reschedule the meeting at a date to be arranged.”

A screenshot of an email message from UPL consultant Vicki King, cancelling the meeting. (Photo: Supplied)

What she failed to mention, however, was that this reporter had been invited to the meeting by the community forum that was set up by the KwaZulu-Natal provincial government at the request of the National Assembly’s Portfolio Committee on Environmental Affairs.

Cognisant that the meeting was being held on UPL business premises rather than neutral turf – and that the company had barred him from a similar meeting held on 23 July last year – Carnie also sent an email message to senior executive Jan Botha three weeks ago, requesting clarity about media attendance at a meeting at its offices. 

The forum was established nearly two years ago by Ravi Pillay, former KwaZulu-Natal MEC for Environmental Affairs. He stressed that the forum was to be “managed independently of UPL”; to create an environment for interested and affected parties to “engage meaningfully” with one another, UPL South Africa and government authorities – and to “act as a conduit for the dissemination of information to communities affected by the incident”.

The broad aims of the multistakeholder forum were set out in this invitation by former KwaZulu-Natal Environment MEC Ravi Pillay. (Image: Supplied)

But UPL executives clearly do not see it that way.

Dr Jeremy Ridl, a senior environmental attorney and convener of the independent forum, confirmed that he was contacted by UPL lawyer Norman Brauteseth just before the meeting, raising concern that this reporter was on the guest list.

Brauteseth had informed him that if forum members insisted on Carnie attending the meeting, then UPL would simply cancel the meeting.

Last year, Brauteseth advanced a series of legalistic objections to justify the exclusion of Daily Maverick from the previous meeting, arguing that the publication was not a formal member of the forum, while company spokesman Japhet Ncube said that UPL “never intended that the broader community or any media would be invited” to the July 2022 meeting.

“There is a significant difference between being banned from a community/open event or meeting and not being invited to a closed, non-public meeting. It is disingenuous to have claimed the former and the title of the article is wholly misleading,” the company said at the time.

Brauteseth also told the forum representatives that “we can talk about reportage on the meeting once it has been held. What we do about further meetings, and whether there should be a more open public meeting in due course, is the next step in our interactions”.

However, several forum members who arrived at the UPL offices were irate about the sudden cancellation of the meeting and the exclusion of the media.

UPL reception staff field queries from irate community forum members about the abrupt cancellation of a meeting about the July 2021 arson attack and chemical spillage in Cornubia. (Photo: Tony Carnie)

“One wonders what UPL is trying to hide?” commented Kwanele Msizazwe, a representative of Blackburn Village, an informal settlement close to the UPL warehouse that bore much of the brunt of the air and waterborne chemical emissions after the fire.

Kamini Krishna, a forum member representing the UPL Civil Society Action Group, noted that several members had taken time off to attend the meeting – only to be turned away at the UPL reception.

She noted that as representatives of the community, forum members wanted to be informed in detail about the long-term consequences for human health and the environment in the aftermath of the pollution – including potential chemical contamination of groundwater in the vicinity of Cornubia.

In his role as forum convener, Ridl said UPL had explained to him that the company was not willing to share certain information in a public forum.

However, Ridl said his personal view was that it was essential for the forum to keep the public informed “and the best way to do this is through competent and credible journalists since the MSF does not have in-house media or communications expertise”.

“If UPL is allowed to dictate to the forum who may attend their meetings, this will certainly create the impression that the forum is ‘captured’,” he said, adding that forum members would now have to consider how to proceed.

Forum member Rico Euripidou, a researcher and epidemiologist with the groundWork environmental justice group, expressed shock at UPL’s sudden decision to cancel the meeting to exclude media.

“Without multi-stakeholder and multi-sectoral cooperation, including the media, we can never expect to achieve the sound management of chemicals and waste. All stakeholders have a role to play. A major step is to remove barriers to information.

“In fact, according to the Strategic Approach to International Chemicals Management's Article 22 of the Dubai Declaration... we are guided to openness and transparency... in making information available, information on chemicals.” DM

Footnote: Late yesterday, UPL attorney Norman Brauteseth set out the company's position on the events in a letter addressed to Dr Ridl and a senior provincial government official chairing an intergovernmental task team on the UPL pollution case.

Brauteseth copied Daily Maverick on this letter in response to our request for UPL comment.

He states that:

"I was advised that the (forum) members would not withdraw the invitation, that Mr Carnie would be coming to the meeting, and that the issue could be dealt with at the UPL premises. On my client’s instructions, and in order to avoid unnecessary confrontation, I was then requested to cancel the meeting, which was done."

He further states that, in UPL's view: "The MSF was envisaged inter alia to provide guidance to UPL in its navigating of engagements with authorities and other stakeholders, particularly when issues arise in which the MSF can assist. The presence of the press at any of those discussions is self-evidently inappropriate."