The minerals and energy director general Sandile Nogxina has said that the rules governing the 51 per cent empowerment stakeholding are only applicable for unused government mineral rights and pending applications for prospecting rights from May 1 2004 to April 30 2005.

The announcement is an attempt to clarify the rules, which have generated much speculation in the mining sector, and follow a meeting between the South African government and key industry figures.

Chamber of Mines' Dr Con Fauconnier told South Africa's Sunday Times that the meeting had clarified a number of issues regarding the application of the laws, adding that further discussion would continue as new issues arose.

The charter will come into full effect once the one-year transitional period has passed but Mr Nogxina acknowledged that misunderstandings had arisen as a result of the lack of regulation governing the requirements for state held minerals rights and land.

"There has always been confusion about the role of the state in the conversion to the new mining order. As the state holds certain mineral rights and land it can decide what it does with this land and mineral rights," he added.

"There has been no reformulation of policy; it has just been a clarification of policy," Nogxina said.

Mr Nogxina said the government had received a series of applications for state held rights in Northern Province for platinum.