Business Report *ANC condemns killing of illegal miners at Aurora mine **Ellis Mnyandu, Wiseman Khuzwayo, Sapa and Bloomberg, Business Report, Johannesburg, 13 August 2010*
The ugly face of South African mining came into sharper focus yesterday as police recovered the bodies of at least four illegal miners allegedly shot dead by Aurora security guards.
The Sowetan reported yesterday that 20 illegal miners had been shot dead in a confrontation with the security guards at an East Rand mine owned by Khulubuse Zuma, a nephew of President Jacob Zuma, and Zondwa Mandela, a grandson of former president Nelson Mandela.
Zuma and Mandela are the chairman and chief executive, respectively, of Aurora Empowerment System, the cash-strapped mining firm that made headlines in June for not paying workers and failing to pump toxic water from under the mine. It was not immediately clear whether the dead were among the miners who had not been paid.
"It's an unfortunate situation," Zuma said, describing what the illegal miners were doing as "pure crime".
"What they are doing they're not supposed to be doing."South African mines have been plagued by illegal mining for several years, prompting Mineral Resources Minister Susan Shabangu in June last year to promise to stamp it out. Shabangu said at the time that a forum would be formed to deal with the problem.
Efforts to reach Jeremy Michaels, the spokesman for the Department of Mineral Resources, were unsuccessful late yesterday afternoon and by 5.30pm the department had not issued a statement.
In a statement issued last night, ANC spokesman Jackson Mthembu said the party "condemns in the strongest terms the senseless killing of illegal miners at the Aurora mine".
Mthembu said the mine management and the responsible security company should have sought the assistance of the SAPS on suspicion of crime being committed in their mine, rather than shooting at first instance.
National Union of Mineworkers (NUM) spokesman Lesiba Seshoka said the union linked the incident to the mine's failure to pay its workers, leaving them "to fend for themselves".
"The NUM calls for an urgent investigation into these allegations and whether or not these were indeed illegal miners," Seshoka said.
Noxolo Kweza, a police spokeswoman at the mine, said: "We don't know what happened, at this stage we're investigating. We have found four bodies underground. We don't know if there are more."
The SAPS and Ekurhuleni Emergency Services declined to comment on whether the deaths resulted from gunfire by the mine security.
However, Leiis Landley, the general manager of the Grootvlei mine, confirmed that security had been underground investigating equipment that was extensively vandalised.
He said there had been an encounter with the illegal miners and shots were fired.
Sam Sithole from Mozambique was one of five survivors. He said he lost two brothers, Marthinus and Kenny Sithole.He said when the security people arrived at about 9am on Monday morning, he switched off his searchlight and was able to get out at 3pm when everything was quite.
He said there were many people underground although he did not know most of them.
Johny Sithole from Randfontein was also there to try and identify his uncle, Johannes Stokwana, who had a wife and an eight-month-old baby.
Paulos Mkhabela of Duduza in Nigel said he transported five of the miners to the shaft on Sunday afternoon and expected to fetch them on Monday.
*From: http://www.busrep.co.za/index.php?fSectionId=552&fArticleId=5599830 <http://www.busrep.co.za/index.php?fSectionId=552&fArticleId=5599830>*
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