sovereign risk in south africa??

I think not!!!!!!!!!

BHP is about to embark on a coal mining project in South Africa.

extract from an article in www.miningweekly.co.za

The world's biggest mining company today announced a new R2,4-billion South African coal-mine project.

Delivering the fifth consecutive record half-year results to December 2005, BHP Billiton CEO Chip Goodyear singled out the proposed Douglas-Middelburg Optimisation (DMO) coal project as one of the company's suite of 25 projects worth $14,4-billion, of which 17 are in execution and eight in feasibility.

The DMO is a brownfields thermal-coal project located in the Witbank area of Mpumalanga. The project combines the resources from the adjacent reserves of Douglas Colliery and Middelburg Mine, which are both joint ventures with Xstrata, BHP Billiton's share being 84%. The project utilises the lower strip ratio areas available at Douglas to replace mined-out areas and high strip-ratio areas of Middelburg Mine. The project will result in the closure of the current underground operation at Douglas Colliery, which is nearing economic exhaustion and the adjacent life expired coal processing facilities. A new coal processing facility optimally located will replace the current facility with existing opencast equipment being used to replace the underground mine. BHP Billiton's newly-promoted group president nonferrous metals Marius Kloppers told Mining Weekly that the DMO project was at feasibility stage, which, with BHP Billiton, invariably meant that there was a good chance of go-ahead.