HUGH NEVILL, Johannesburg | Monday
SOUTH Africa’s top government labour official has ordered a clampdown on dangerous working conditions following the fiery deaths of 11 night-shift workers locked into in a Johannesburg chemicals factory.
“Employers who do not adhere to occupational health safety regulations should expect a zero tolerance approach from the department, which will not tolerate any employer who does not place priority on worker safety,” said labour department director general Rams Ramashia, speaking at the scene, where he was leading a team of investigators.
Ramashia, who has opened an official investigation into the blaze, said he was “outraged and dismayed” at evidence that all the doors and gates had been locked.
Margaret Washington, a worker who stayed home Friday night because she was ill and had a “bad feeling” about going to work, told the Sunday Times that ESS Chem factory owner Solly Lachporia always locked the workers in because he was afraid they would steal items from the factory.
Police recovered the last bodies Sunday morning but called in a dog sniffer team in case there had been more people in the factory than reported.
Ramashia was “very concerned about reports that the company had not provided emergency escape exits, which by itself is a violation of safety regulations,” he added.
The trapped employees could not even telephone for help because the telephone was in a locked and burglar-proofed office, the Sunday Times reported.
It quoted Billy Nomqca, who sells fruit at the factory entrance, as saying that he saw Lachporia lock the factory doors before the fire.
“Since I started selling fruit here six months ago the workers have always been locked in,” Nomqca said.
John Phongwayao, a security guard at a nearby nightclub, said he had to watch helplessly as a woman trapped inside cried for help.
“I saw one woman holding onto the mesh gate and she was crying,” he told The Sunday Times.
“I saw other people falling into the fire. The lady was still crying when the factory exploded seconds later. Then there was just silence.”
Lachporia’s brother Imo denied the workers had been locked in, saying the claims were “totally fabricated”.
Chemicals, including highly inflammable white spirits which had been stored illegally inside the factory, are thought to have spilled near a gas burner, starting the fire and subsequent explosion of gas bottles.
Forensic experts said the chemicals should by law have been kept outside the building.
Burnt chemicals and plastic containers formed a molten mass around the bodies, creating difficulties for the police search. – AFP