MINING ACT 1978 - SECT 114

MINING ACT 1978 - SECT 114

114 .         Removal of mining plant on expiry, surrender or forfeiture of mining tenement

        (1)         In this section —

        mining plant means any building, plant, machinery, equipment, tools or any other property of any kind whether affixed to land or not so affixed;

        prescribed period means a period of 3 months after a mining tenement expires or is surrendered or forfeited or such longer period thereafter as the Minister from time to time or in any particular case determines and is hereby authorised to determine.

        (2)         When a mining tenement expires or is surrendered in whole or in part or forfeited —

            (a)         the person who was the holder of the mining tenement immediately prior to such expiry, surrender or forfeiture; or

            (b)         any other person,

                who is entitled to any mining plant lawfully erected or brought onto the land or the part of the land to which the mining tenement related by a former holder thereof or any predecessor in title, may, within the prescribed period, remove any such mining plant.

        (3)         Where any such mining plant is not so removed within the prescribed period, the Minister may, at any time thereafter, call upon such holder or other person as is referred to in subsection (2) to show cause, within such period as the Minister may determine, why any mining plant that has not been so removed should not be sold and removed.

        (4)         Where such holder or person does not, within the period determined by the Minister, show cause to the satisfaction of the Minister why any such mining plant should not be sold and removed, the Minister may direct the mining plant to be sold by public auction and be removed.

        (5)         The proceeds of the sale of any mining plant pursuant to subsection (4), after deducting the cost of and incidental to the sale or the sale and the removal of the mining plant, shall be paid to such holder of the mining tenement or other person as is referred to in subsection (2), of whose claim thereto the Minister has had notice in writing prior to the payment of the proceeds.

        (6)         The Minister shall determine whether or not any mining plant shall be allowed to remain on the land that was the subject of the mining tenement and if so, the period for which it may so remain and the amount of rent that shall be paid for the use and occupation of the land on which the mining plant is allowed to remain and to whom the rent shall be due and payable.

        (7)         Where —

            (a)         a mining tenement expires or is surrendered in whole or in part or forfeited; and

            (b)         at the time of that expiry, surrender or forfeiture, the person (in this subsection called the former holder ) who was the holder of the mining tenement immediately before its expiry, surrender or forfeiture leaves any tailings or other mining product upon the land or part of the land that was the subject of the mining tenement,

                the tailings or other mining product become or becomes the property of the Crown —

            (c)         at the expiration of the prescribed period, if the former holder does not —

                  (i)         remove; or

                  (ii)         bona fide treat and continue to treat,

                the tailings or other mining product within that period; or

            (d)         at the expiration of a period of 3 months from the time when, in the opinion of the Minister, treatment of the tailings or other mining product is discontinued, if the former holder, having commenced treatment of the tailings or other mining product within the prescribed period, discontinues that treatment after the expiration of the prescribed period.

        (8)         The Minister shall determine the amount of rent that shall be paid for the use and occupation of the land on which the tailings or other mining product are allowed to remain and the land used in relation to the treatment of the tailings or other mining product and to whom the rent shall be due and payable.

        (9)         Nothing in this section affects any valid agreement made by the holder of a mining tenement with the owner or occupier of any land to which the tenement relates in respect of mining plant or tailings or other mining product left on such land after the prescribed period, and this section shall be construed subject to such an agreement.

        (10)         Notwithstanding the foregoing provisions of this section, no timber or other material used and applied in the construction or support of any shaft, drive, gallery, adit, terrace, race, dam or other mining work shall be removed without the consent in writing of the Minister.

        [Section 114 amended: No. 37 of 1993 s. 18.]