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ANA reports that the health of some of the hundreds of mine workers who were staging a sit-in underground at the Lanxess chrome mine outside Rustenburg was deteriorating, a worker indicated on Wednesday.
He was speaking via a two-way radio from underground to National Union of Metalworkers of SA (Numsa) shop steward, Kgaratji Tselana. "It's very bad ... not nice ... people are suffocating from the fumes we are inhaling," the worker was heard saying. Tselana said the striking workers had no food and they were surviving only on water. The number of workers who have come to the surface for medical attention now stands at 12. At least 10 of them were brought to the surface earlier in the week. According to Tselana, the number of workers involved in the underground strike stood at 245. Numsa members began their underground sit-in on 19 June, demanding recognition of their union, the reinstatement of dismissed workers and the suspension of a mine captain who has been accused of sexual harassment. Ronny Lennox, a Numsa representative, said the main concern at the moment was to get food to the workers underground. "Our members have been on strike since last week Wednesday, and management does not allow food to go underground which is the biggest thing," complained Lennox. However, the mine said Numsa had worsened the situation for the striking workers, because some of them were being held against their will underground.
- Read the full original of the report on this story at Mining Weekly
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