Lily Mine cancels commemoration
Vantage Goldfields Limited says the commemoration service planned at Lily Mine this coming Sunday has been cancelled.
No reasons have been given for the cancellation.
Yvonne Mnisi, Pretty Nkambule, and Solomon Nyarenda were trapped underground when the lamp room container they were working in fell into the sinkhole created by a collapsed crown pillar before being covered by huge rocks on 5 February 2016.
Trade union federation Cosatu and the National Union of Mineworkers (NUM) earlier said they would boycott the commemoration.
NUM says it believes there is nothing to commemorate, because the bodies of the workers have not been found.
"We have not lost hope that the miners should be rescued from underground. So what are we commemorating? Are we commemorating that those mineworkers are still trapped in the belly of the earth? The people who are organising this kind event are unreasonable and they do not care. Shame unto them. We are not going to participate in this event. We will make sure that those workers are rescued whether they are alive or dead. We believe that god is great. For now, we cannot speak about any commemoration and we are not going to be part of it, NUM Deputy President Joseph Montisetse.
Meanwhile, Cosatu called on workers and local authorities in Mpumalanga to boycott the commemorations.
Cosatu's Sizwe Pamla says they reiterate their demand for the mine management and the Department of Mineral Resources to fulfil and honour the many promises that were made to the workers and their families.
"Some workers were promised alternative employment and others were promised payments, but nothing has happened since those promises were made. It is pure arrogance for the company to be planning remembrance ceremonies, while they have failed the poor workers and their families. This also surely adds another reason for government to step in by nationalising some of the mines on behalf of the workers and the people of South Africa," says Pamla.