Nov. 6 (Bloomberg) -- South Africa’s ruling African National Congress party said it won’t support calls for the nationalization of the country’s mines by groups including its own youth league and the Congress of South African Trade Unions.

The government has reactivated a dormant state-owned mining company and is pushing ahead with plans to charge royalties to miners, Gwede Mantashe, the secretary general of the ANC, said in an e-mailed copy of a speech made yesterday to members of the South African Municipal Workers Union in Bela Bela, north of Johannesburg.

The ANC, which has requested “concrete ideas” for the industry, is not going to “just pledge hollow support for the nationalization of mines,” Mantashe said.

South Africa is the world’s biggest producer of platinum, chrome, vanadium and manganese, the third-largest gold miner and the largest source of coal for European power plants. Anglo American Plc, BHP Billiton Ltd. and Xstrata Plc are among companies that own assets in the country.

To contact the reporter on this story: Antony Sguazzin in Johannesburg at asguazzin@bloomberg.net

Last Updated: November 6, 2009 03:08 EST