The safety of miners engaged in an underground strike since Friday is more important than labour grievances, the Congress of South African Trade Unions (Cosatu) said on Monday.
”They [mine management] might be 120 times wrong but we must focus on the health and safety of the miners now to avert a crisis,” said Cosatu spokesperson Zed Luzipho.
Mine managers and trade union representatives were meeting at the Zululand Anthracite Colliery outside Ulundi in northern KwaZulu-Natal on Monday in an attempt to resolve the strike.
Luzipho said three workers have already collapsed since the underground strike began in the Kwashaleza shaft, and their oxygen supply is fast running out.
A spokesperson for the mine, Michael Campbell, said the dispute arose after the mine was sold by Ingwe Colliers to Riversdale Mining.
Campbell said the mine was sold as a going concern and it is business as usual, but the ”miners want to be retrenched and then reapply for their jobs”.
He said the mine is fully serviced with water and electricity and that the workers are receiving food from the mine canteen.
The Durban High Court issued an interdict against the miners at the weekend stating that the strike is illegal, forbidding workers from inciting non-strikers to join them, and ordering them to leave the shaft.
Between 600 and 1 000 workers are believed to be in the mine after the initial group was joined by more strikers on Sunday.
Police spokesperson Captain Vusi Mbatha said police are patrolling the area but there have been no incidents of violence or intimidation. — Sapa