Heritage Cases

The proposed Oshoek Site Clearance and border post is located on the border with Swaziland and South Africa in a valley near the town of Mbabane (Swaziland) within the Mpumalanga Province. The proposed border post is envisaged to prevent entrance of unrestricted vehicles. It is proposed that the border post enables agreements between South Africa and Swaziland to provide an enabling legal basis of the two Governments. The Oshoek border post will be a place integrate risk and information management, improve cooperation and reduce illegal border crossing and related logistics costs. The purpose of the Basic Assessment Report in terms of the National Environmental Management Act, 1998 (Act No. 107 of 1998): EIA regulations 2014 (as amended on 7 April 2017) is to through a consultative process: • Identify the policy and legislative context within which the proposed development is located and how the development aligns with policies and legislation; • Identify the alternatives considered in respect of the development; • Provide a description of the need and desirability of the development; • Determine through an impact and risk assessment the nature, significance, consequence, extent, duration and probability of the impacts occurring and the degree to which: they can be reversed, may cause irreplaceable loss of resources and can be avoided, managed or mitigated; and • Identify preferred alternatives, suitable measures to avoid, manage or mitigate impacts and identify residual risks that will need to be managed and monitored. The basic assessment report assessed all alternatives and concluded after assessing the ecological, heritage, visual and wetland aspects that the proposal or preferred alternative would be the best suited for the initiative proposed by the Department of Public Works. Mitigation measures and impact ratings are provided and should be adhered to, to ensure that the environmental features impacted upon be mitigated against to have minimal impacts on them. The basic assessment ends with recommendations that the Environmental Assessment Practitioner (EAP) proposed to be included with the Environmental Authorisation. It is of the EAPs opinion that the development thus may proceed and that this report together with the specialist studies will satisfactorily mitigate against any negative social and bio-physical impacts anticipated with the aid of the Specialist recommendation and Environmental Management Programme (EMPr).