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Aquarius Platinum was flagged first for breaking the trust to jointly improve safety in South Africa&rsquo;s mines. The company boasted to the Johannesburg Stock Exchange that it had won a clean bill-of-health from the nation&rsquo;s Department of Minerals and Energy (DME) at two of its South African mines. It had not. 
 
&ldquo;I would like to state categorically that the DME has not yet cleared any SA mine as part of the audit process,&rdquo; said the DME, referring to a President Mbeki-commissioned safety audit of all South African mines following the near-tragedy at Harmony Gold on 3 October 2007 when 3,200 miners were trapped for up to 38 hours. 
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&ldquo;Claims by the company that it has received a &lsquo;clean bill-of-health&rsquo; or that it has &lsquo;passed&rsquo; the &lsquo;Presidential Audit&rsquo; are thus unfounded,&rdquo; the DME said in the statement to refute Aquarius Platinum&rsquo;s claim to capital markets. 
 
In the middle of last week&rsquo;s controversy, which the National Union of Mineworkers (NUM) aptly dubbed, &lsquo;Tell No Lies, Claim No Easy Victories,&rsquo; a contract worker was killed at Marikana, one of the mines in the Bushveld belt of North West Province that Aquarius claimed was DME certified. That death occurred on 8 January. A company spokesman, contacted 10 January by Mining Weekly, said the company would stand by its stock market statement.
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&nbsp;NUM Gen. Sec. Frans Baleni 
 

The NUM was quick to denounce Aquarius for the false boast, calling it &ldquo;a reflection of how playful the industry is when dealing with the lives of people.&rdquo; NUM General Secretary Frans Baleni said the company must be more sensitive and to refrain from such deviant behaviour. Baleni said NUM does not &ldquo;have the slightest doubt that the audits are going to produce something contrary&rdquo; at Aquarius mines. 
 
Aquarius Platinum operates the Kroondal, Marikana, and Everest platinum mines in South Africa, and is a joint venture partner in the Mimosa platinum mine in Zimbabwe. It also operates a chromite ore tailings treatment plant near Kroondal. Based in Australia, the 12-year-old company saw 300% income growth between 2005 and 2006, as well experiencing a sales growth of nearly 100% in that period. Impala Platinum controls a sizeable minority stake in Aquarius.

Aquarius Platinum: Integrity on Mine Safety Broken in South Africa

&ldquo;We, the representatives of coalmine workers from Australia, Belgium, Canada, Columbia, France, Germany, Mongolia, New Zealand, Poland, Russia, South Africa, Ukraine, United Kingdom and India, having met in Kolkata India, 14th &ndash; 16th December 2007 make the following declaration: 
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1. We note from the proud history of militant and long drawn struggle by coalminers&rsquo; unions throughout the world, that when coalminers stand strong and determined significant gains have been made in the areas of safety and health, in conditions of employment and, in many cases, within the political structures of Countries. We, the attendees of this Conference, pledge to do all in our power, to strengthen and continue that proud tradition. 
2. While we recognize that our members work in one of the most hazardous industries on earth, we refuse to accept that the appalling toll of death, injury and disease that prevails in the coal mining industry can be permitted to continue. 
3. As a first step, we demand that all countries not only take the necessary steps to ratify ILO Convention C176, but that they also take urgent action to ensure that the commitments continued in the Convention are put into practice. 
4. Acknowledging that ratification of the Convention alone will not make mines safer we call on the ILO and the United Nations, to further strengthen the regime in place to ensure that ratifying Countries are in fact complying with the commitments contained in the Convention, and to seriously consider a programme of audits and inspections. 
5. This Conference rejects the siren song of the privatization of State assets where it is nothing more than an excuse to replace the secure employment of workers engaged in those State enterprises, with the insecurity of employment by companies whose only interest is that of maximizing profit and investor returns. 
 
To allow the exploitation of a State&rsquo;s non-renewable resources for the sole purpose of profit by coal companies and major corporations, and to leave the employment of workers and the welfare of their families to the vagaries of the so-called &ldquo;free market&rdquo; is inexcusable, unwarranted and unacceptable. Conference particularly offers common cause to the Indian coal mining unions in their struggle to stop the privatization of the Indian coal industry. 
6. This Conference notes the disproportionate blame being laid at the feet of the Coal Industry and the burning of coal as a contributor to the current climate change crisis confronting the planet. It is convenient for many to single out coal for strident criticism, while neglecting other significant sources of global greenhouse gas emissions. Any skepticism concerning the validity of the genesis of climate change must be tempered by the reality of the threat that exists to the continuation of large sections of the international coal mining industry, as the industry is targeted by its critics. 
7. The coal industry must respond to this challenge, and conference calls on both Governments and Companies &ndash; in particular those that operate in the rich developed nations (Companies whose principal purpose for exploiting coal reserves is the generation of profit) &ndash; to properly fund research into and establish practical applications of clean coal technology. 
8. This funding must be significant, not merely token, and can easily be afforded by Companies which are making record profits as a consequence of the current unprecedented resources boom being fuelled by the rapid expansion of the economies of developing nations. 
9. This Conference notes the growing trend in almost every Country represented here, of coal industry employers, both State owned and private to engage contract and casual labour in preference to permanent employees, and we express our strident condemnation of this practice. &ldquo;Outsourcing&rdquo; &ldquo;Contracting&rdquo; and &ldquo;Casualisation&rdquo; not only pose a direct threat to the secure employment of permanent employees, but exposes the outsourced and causal workers to reduced wages and conditions lower safety standards, diminished employment security and serious difficulties in accessing basic trade union rights to organize and collectively bargain. 
10. We the delegates, declare this, the first International Coalminers&rsquo; Conference, to have been an outstanding success. We express our sincere appreciation to our Indian Trade Union colleagues for their hospitality and professionalism in hosting and staging this event. 
11. We have been afforded a remarkable opportunity to share the experiences, the knowledge, the comradeship and the solidarity of coalminers from around the World. We call on our National Unions and our International Organisations to support an ongoing role for this Conference. 
 
Irrespective of our politics, our race, creed, colour, or our international affiliations, we are all coalminers and we wish to be afforded the chance to meet and discuss coalminer&rsquo;s issues and to seek solutions to coalminer&rsquo;s problems and concerns. Conference respectfully requests that national and international unions represented here, give serious and favourable consideration to the continued operation of the original preparatory committee to oversee progress on the matters raised in this Declaration, and to be responsible for convening a second International Coalminers&rsquo; Conference at an appropriate time in the future.&rdquo;

Coal Conference Declaration, Kolkata, India

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Global Union/World Bank Consultations
The ITUC and four Global Union Federations (EI, ICEM, ITF and PSI) were invited to consultations on HIV/AIDS with the World Bank on 10 and 11 December. 
 
The objectives of the consultations were to identify complementarities between worker organisations and World Bank involvement in HIV/AIDS in Africa and to draft sector-specific action plans. 
 
The World Bank Group consists of the IBRD (middle-income countries loan facility), IDA (soft loan and grant facility for low-income countries) and IFC (commercial loan window, which has its own AIDS programme &ndash; IFC Against AIDS, Protecting People and Profitability and which published the HIV/AIDS Guide for the Mining Sector). 
 
Since 1986, and with the operation of the Africa Multi-Country AIDS Program (MAP) from 2000, about USD 2.6 billion have been committed. MAP alone committed some 1.5 billion since 2000 in 30 countries and five sub-regional projects. World Bank funds are usually channelled through the national HIV/AIDS coordinating body. 
 
50% of MAP funds were earmarked for NGOs. According to the MAP 2000-2006 publication The Africa Multi-Country AIDS Program 2000-2006, available at <a href="http://www.worldbank.org">www.worldbank.org</a>, 41,000 organisations in 25 countries benefited. More than 2.2 million workers were reached with workplace programmes. 
 
The World Bank continues its commitment to fight HIV/AIDS and has developed a new Agenda for Action 2007-2011. One of the objectives is to scale-up targeted multi-sectoral responses. Thus, the sector-specific meetings focused on mainstreaming HIV/AIDS in key sectors which include mining and energy &ndash; also ICEM key sectors. The ICEM will continue its work with the World Bank and include capacity building and knowledge sharing and generation for unions in infrastructure projects financed by the World Bank. 
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VCT Counsellors&rsquo; Training for ICEM Affiliates 
The low uptake of voluntary counselling and testing was a reason for the ICEM to focus on the training of counsellors from its own affiliates. With a grant from a major pharmaceutical company, training courses were held in Botswana, Namibia, South Africa and Tanzania with participants from all ICEM affiliates in these countries. 
 
In cooperation with professional service providers 40 VCT counsellors were trained in the course of 2007. The ICEM will monitor their deployment and work in 2008 in order to assess the impact of unionists in the up-scaling of VCT.
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Global Fund Round 8 Proposals 
The Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria is scheduled to issue its call for proposals for Round 8 on 1 March 2008. From that date, applicants will have 120 days to prepare and submit their proposals. 
 
Although this seems a fair amount of time, the demanding proposal form and complicated procedures may require more time. There is no reason to start the process now. For unions that means getting membership on Country Coordinating Mechanisms (CCM) to make sure that workplace projects are included in proposals to the Global Fund. 
 
(Source: Global Fund Observer Issue 82, 7 December 2007. GFO is a free service of Aidspan <a href="http://www.aidspan.org">www.aidspan.org</a>. To receive GFO, send an email to <a href="mailto:receive-gfo-newsletter@aidspan.org">receive-gfo-newsletter@aidspan.org</a>) 
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Zambia: Women and AIDS
Domestic violence and poverty are preventing many Zambian women from accessing AIDS drugs, thus undermining the government&rsquo;s ambitious treatment programme. 
 
About 16% of adults in Zambia are HIV-positive and, in urban areas, the prevalence rate exceeds 20%, with infection rates higher among women. The government provides antiretroviral drugs free of charge. 
 
A report by New York-based Human Rights Watch attributes the inadequate treatment of women to fear of violence from husbands which prevents women from getting tested. In other cases, women are left without financial means for transportation and a proper diet after divorce or death of their husbands leaves them destitute as property is seized by the husband&rsquo;s family. 
 
(Source: Associated Press, 18 December 2007) 
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Nigerian Ministry Develops HIV/AIDS Workplace Policy
The Nigerian Federal Ministry of Women Affairs and Social Development recently developed a policy that provides a framework for addressing HIV/AIDS in the workplace. The policy seeks to protect the rights of HIV-positive workers, as well as to foster a safe and healthy work environment for employees with a zero tolerance to psychological abuse, stigma and discrimination. 
 
HIV/AIDS should be treated as any other chronic illness in the workplace in terms of employee benefits, including health and life insurance, disability benefits and leave of absence. 
 
(Source: Daily Trust, 17 December 2007) 
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Bono&rsquo;s Brand
In January 2006, Bono, the Irish rock star, launched Product Red, to raise money for HIV/AIDS work in Africa. So far Red, which licenses its logo to brands including Apple, Motorola, Armani, Gap, Converse and American Express, has donated USD 50 million to the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria. 
 
While this is more than a lot of countries have contributed to the Global Fund, growth of Red has slowed down as few new companies have signed up and as the products are only available in a limited number of countries. 
 
(Source: Financial Times, 1-2 December 2007)
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News from the Global Union Programme and Global Unions
In its most recent HIV/AIDS updates (nos. 34 and 35 of 1 and 15 December) the International Transport Workers&rsquo; Federation (ITF) <a href="http://www.itfglobal.org">www.itfglobal.org</a> reports, among others, on its Latin American regional HIV/AIDS workshop, which focused on developing a prevention culture to control the epidemic; on the implementation of a workplace HIV/AIDS programme by the Namibia Transport and Allied Workers&rsquo; Union and on programmes in India.

ICEM HIV/AIDS e-bulletin

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Following overwhelming rejection of a collective agreement proposal on 28 September, 500 members of New Zealand&rsquo;s Engineering, Printing, and Manufacturing Union (EPMU) have put off industrial action late last week after the plastic employers&rsquo; association promised to improve their offer.
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EPMU National Industry Officer Rachel Mackintosh said the decision to call off the strike was taken reluctantly, but employers pledged in talks late last week to revise the offer to include added leave time and recognition for long-time service. &ldquo;At this stage, we don&rsquo;t know the details of the offer, but the heat is on the employers because they know we&rsquo;re determined to see this through and get a fair deal,&rdquo; said Mackintosh. 
 
She said the union&rsquo;s bargaining committee for plastics thought it was important to give bosses one further opportunity to include added leave time in a new proposal. The EPMU represents plastics manufacturing workers of 13 companies at 16 worksites.
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On 28 September, 81% of the workers voted to reject a prior industry offer based on the failure to address their service leave claim. They also endorsed a resolution to engage in industrial action. In the first two weeks of September, EPMU members in plastics manufacturing had rejected an earlier employers&rsquo; proposal. 
 
EPMU members in metal sector bargaining won an extra week&rsquo;s leave in that set of talks in 2007, and plastics workers of the EPMU are adamant on posting the same gains.

Plastic Manufacturing Strike in New Zealand Averted for Now

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Three US congressional members from the US House of Represents have written to American management of Continental AG, asking that they rescind the deep medical cuts made to a retirees&rsquo; health care plan when the company closed tyre plants in the US. 
 
Linda S&aacute;nchez (California), Stephen Lynch (Massachusetts), and Michael Michaud (Maine), members of the Labor and Working Families Caucus of the US Congress, called on the German company to &ldquo;promptly fulfil Continental&rsquo;s contractual obligations to retired workers.&rdquo;
The letter was on behalf of ICEM affiliate United Steelworkers (USW), which has pressed through court and other actions that Continental&rsquo;s unilateral change to the health care plan was illegal. Effective 1 March 2007, the rubber maker imposed a US$3,000 annual cap on health care payments for each of 2,500 retired Conti workers and dependents. The USW contends that some retirees now must pay up to US$12,000 per year in out-of-pocket money to cover their health care needs. 
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On 31 July 2007, a US federal district judge, in a summary judgement in the state of Ohio, ruled that Continental had illegally reduced the benefit levels for retirees and dependents, stating the company must fulfil its contractual obligations with the USW over health care premiums and funding. Continental Tire of North American, the US subsidiary, immediately filed an appeal to that judgement in another US court. 
 
The decision to appeal and delay rightful health care benefits was a blow to former Continental workers in Charlotte, state of North Carolina; Mayfield, state of Kentucky, and Byron, Ohio, where, in 2006, they had already been victims of Continental plant closings. 
 
The US elected representatives, speaking out for fairness and justice, told Continental that its practices were having a devastating impact on its American retirees. The letter stated that considering the 30-plus years of dedicated service by former Continental employees performed, as well as the extraordinary health hazards inside the tyre industry, it is hard to understand the inadequate health care benefits these retirees now receive.

US Congress Members Urge Continental AG to Rescind Retiree Health Care Cuts

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Strong, last-minute arm-twisting by the US government apparently proved effective, as Costa Ricans went to the polls yesterday, 7 October, in a referendum on ratification of the Central American Free Trade Agreement (CAFTA) with the US. With over 90% of polling complete early on Monday, the &ldquo;yes&rdquo; vote has gained just over 50%, while those voting against tallied 47.6%. 
 
Some 60% of Costa Rica&rsquo;s 2.6 million voters turned out for Sunday&rsquo;s balloting. A 40% turnout was needed to make the plebiscite legally binding. Costa Rica was the only one of six Latin countries to put ratification of CAFTA before voters. Earlier, the governments of the Dominican Republic, El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, and Nicaragua ratified CAFTA, which will open trading markets between the countries and the US. 
 
On Saturday, the Bush administration issued a terse warning to Costa Rica&rsquo;s citizens, stating that if ratification did not occur, it would not extend existing preferential tariffs on certain goods traded between the two countries. The US government also said under no circumstances would it re-negotiate the trade agreement with Costa Rica.
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In polls taken as late as the middle of last week, proponents of a &ldquo;no&rdquo; vote, led by unions and others under the banner &ldquo;Patriotic Movement Against FTA and US,&rdquo; were leading in polls, with upwards of 55% of Costa Ricans saying they would reject the plan. The opponents, including national labour centres Central del Movimiento de Trabajadores Costarricenses (CMTC) and the Confederaci&oacute;n de Trabajadores Rerum Navarum (CTRN), have been deeply suspicious of the US-prescribed trade and privatisation agreement. 
 
Specifically, they expressed concern over a flood of cheap US food products entering the country. Opponents also cited privatisation of Costa Rica&rsquo;s state-run telecommunications company, the country&rsquo;s insurance services, and its agriculture industry. 
 
In the waning days of the campaign, however, besides the campaign interference by the US government, President Oscar Arias &ndash; a proponent &ndash; termed a &ldquo;no&rdquo; vote as &ldquo;collective suicide.&rdquo; Two month&rsquo;s before Sunday&rsquo;s vote, a high-level memorandum from top aides of Arias was leaked that outlined a dirty tricks campaign against the &ldquo;no&rdquo; faction. The memo caused the temporary resignation of Second Vice President and Planning Minister Kevin Casas.

Costa Rica Narrowly Passes Free Trade Pact in 7 October Balloting

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Three weeks after suspending a scheduled 12 September strike, 2,000 copper mining and smelting workers in Peru downed tools on 2 October in an indefinite strike. The strike, against Grupo M&eacute;xico&rsquo;s Southern Copper Corporation, came after the mining and metals federation &ndash; ICEM affiliate FNTMMSP &ndash; halted strike action after miners voted on 11 September to give government mediated talks a chance to work. 
 
Following the start of last week&rsquo;s strike, the FNTMMSP called on Labour Minister Susana Pinilla to quicken the dialogue in order to find solutions to unresolved issues. FNTMMSP will mobilise toward a national strike across the mining sector on 5 November unless issues get resolved at Southern Copper and other mining enterprises.
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The strike by Peruvian miners at troubled Grupo M&eacute;xico instantly raised copper prices nearly 1% on world markets. The strike occurred at Southern Copper&rsquo;s Toquepala and Cuajure mines, and at its Ilo smelter. Workers are demanding a fair pay package of 11%, while Grupo M&eacute;xico seeks longer shifts and proposes a pay offer of less than half of what the union seeks. The company predicts a strike of any duration will cause 2007 production losses to exceed 10%. Southern Copper produces 370,000 tonnes of copper annually from its Peruvian operations. 
 
Southern Copper&rsquo;s miners took short strike actions in May and June of this year. The company&rsquo;s chief attack has been to file charges with the government claiming the strikes are illegal. 
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Grupo M&eacute;xico is also fighting miners in Mexico. Since 30 July, Mexican mining and metals union, SNTMMRM, has been striking three operations of the company, including the Cananea copper mine in northern Mexico, near the US border. The other two mines are a silver, lead, and zinc mine, near Taxco in Guerrero state, and the San Mart&iacute;n zinc mine in Zacatecas. 
 
Mexican miners are striking over demands for collective agreements, and better health and safety conditions. Grupo M&eacute;xico has responded by announcing mine closures, citing depletion of resources, and seeking to declare the strikes illegal.

Grupo Mexico’s Miners in Peru Strike for Fair Pay

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ICEM North American affiliate United Steelworkers (USW) issued a public letter to Colombian President Alvaro Uribe last week warning that a paramilitary group called the &ldquo;Black Eagles&rdquo; has recently threatened leaders of food and beverage union SINALTRAINAL in the area of Bucaramanga, Santander state, with death. 
 
The USW said the group stated they would &ldquo;bury the union members and their families in a mass grave on Christmas Day if they do not cease their union activities and leave the area.&rdquo; The US-based union specifically named SINALTRAINAL leaders Javier Correa, Luis Eduardo Garcia, and Jose Domingo Florez as the recipients of the death threats.
<img height="174" src="" width="150" alt="" />
USW President Leo Gerard
In the USW letter to Uribe, President Leo Gerard writes of a specific incident related to Jose Florez on 27 September. He says the son of the union leader was picked up by armed men, thrown into a van, beaten, and then released with the message they would not stop until Florez&rsquo;s father was dismembered. 
 
Gerard&rsquo;s letter to Uribe reminded the Colombia President that the country leads the world in the number of trade unionists who are ruthlessly killed each year. The South American country, Gerard wrote, &ldquo;represents 54% of all trade union killings world-wide. And so far in 2007, the official Colombian government figure of trade union leaders killed is 23.&rdquo; 
 
Gerard added, &ldquo;We are very concerned about this situation, especially as impunity in Colombia for the slaying of trade unionists remains at over 98%.&rdquo;
<img height="92" alt="" src="" width="200" />
Meanwhile, the USW and the US-based Human Rights Fund have appealed a decision by a US district court in the state of Alabama against Drummond Coal, a company that operates in Colombia and the US. The civil suit is on behalf of surviving family members of trade union leaders of Sintramienerg&eacute;tica. The USW believes these leaders were murdered in 2001 by paramilitary forces, with the complicity of the American coal company. 
 
In July 2007, a federal district court in Alabama denied testimony from relevant witnesses to the murders of three trade union leaders and ruled Drummond not guilty with connection to the killings. The USW and Human Rights Watch have now appealed that ruling to a US Federal Circuit Court of Appeals bench in Atlanta, Georgia. 
 
The case was filed on behalf of family members of Valmore Lacarno, Victor Oracasita, and Gustavo Soler. The case falls under the US Alien Tort Claims Act, which allows foreign citizens to file financial damage lawsuits in US courtrooms against American companies in crimes committed outside the US. The ICEM is aiding the USW in bringing the correct and necessary testimony to this set of grizzly killings in Colombia to the US justice system.

Steelworkers Issue Immediate and Specific Warning to Colombia on Death Threats to Union Leaders

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This week, on 10-11 October, the Japanese Trade Union Confederation, RENGO, will hold its Congress in Tokyo, and high on the agenda is an action plan featuring the strengthening of wages, benefits, and rights for non-regular workers. This plan means both RENGO and Japanese trade union federation UI Zensen have now prioritised that part-time and limited-term workers receive equal treatment in Japan&rsquo;s social-work agenda.
<img height="156" alt="" src="" width="110" />
Rengo is highlighting attention for temporary employees, part-time staff, and contract and agency workers in two-year action policies on both Equality and Work-Life Balance. The improvement of working conditions for such workers is listed as a major goal, and this comes from RENGO&rsquo;s already existing Joint Actions with Part-Time Workers Committee.
The federation will issue a Declaration on Reforming Working Patterns and follow that statement up with a multi-faceted campaign. That campaign will ensure, among other things, a liveable wage for temporary and part-time workers. As one of three focal points for work in the 2008-2009 period, &ldquo;RENGO will give top priority to strengthening support for and collaboration with non-regular workers and employees at smaller companies, and will work with affiliates and local RENGOs to reform working patterns with a view to guaranteeing the rights of all workers and improving their working conditions.&rdquo; 
<img height="51" alt="" src="" width="206" />&nbsp;&nbsp;
&nbsp;<img height="68" alt="" src="" width="180" />
In the other two focal points, RENGO&rsquo;s action policies state that the confederation and its affiliates at unionised enterprises will resist unreasonable &ldquo;factors of society, and demand social responsibility&rdquo; from companies and employers&rsquo; associations; and that Rengo will engage in total efforts to promote campaigns that are rooted in local communities, which will vitalise these communities and build greater trust by local people of the trade union movement.
In the year 2001&rsquo;s set of national bargaining, RENGO first started including hourly wage increases for temporary and part-time workers, and last year the union engaged in joint shunto negotiations with part-time workers. The confederation reports that 251 affiliated labour unions realised hourly wage gains for part-time workers last year.
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The action plan for 2008-2009 includes establishment of a labour consultation centre at RENGO headquarters, in which pay-raise negotiations for non-regular workers will be coordinated, and the centre will fully cooperate with unions that represent non-regular workers employed under temporary or fixed-term contracts. The centre will also actively utilise the internet as a mutual aid service for non-regular workers, and will open consultation channels for foreign workers employed in Japan. 
 
Japanese unions are acutely aware that the number of workers recruited for full-time employment has decreased, while recruitment of temp staff and part-time workers has dramatically increased. That has been a major reason why, last year, the average annual income of company employees declined for the ninth consecutive year in Japan.

RENGO Prioritises Increased Rights for Temporary Workers in Japan

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Even though none of the 3,200 miners trapped for up to 38 hours last week at Harmony Gold&rsquo;s Elandsrand mine died, the near catastrophe re-emphasises the need for beefed up safety measures in the world&rsquo;s mining industry. 
 
The miners, members of ICEM affiliate National Union of Mineworkers (NUM), became trapped after a 15-metre piece of steel pipe from a compressed air chamber exploded, and dropped 2.2 kilometres down an elevator shaft. The steel pipe severed electrical cables and shattered steelwork connected to the mine&rsquo;s main elevator.
Rescue commenced through a smaller ventilation shaft that is also used to lift rock and waste from the mine. Rescue teams placed a cage in that shaft and it was able to free 75 miners each half-hour. NUM dispatched shop stewards into the deep shafts in order to calm miners and to bring them bread and water. 
<img height="60" src="" width="100" alt="" />
But the accident again underscores the necessity for better mine safety techniques at a time of climbing prices and rapid extraction practices of natural resources. Harmony purchased the 30-year-old Elandsrand mine and an adjoining gold mine from AngloGold Ashanti in 2001, at a time when production had dropped. Harmony saw the potential to mine even deep into the earth, and planned a new mine under the existing one that the company expects to complete by 2011. 
 
NUM members were trapped some 2,200 metres below the ground. Gold mines in South Africa are particular deep, and gold mining in the country is labour intensive. As higher commodity prices take hold, mining companies forge deeper underground, making the technical challenges greater and the safety costs higher. The deeper the mines go, the greater the likelihood of seismic activity. This puts miners at tremendous risk. 
 
The NUM is convinced that lack of maintenance, coupled with the continuous, 24-hour mining operations now being implemented across South Africa&rsquo;s mining industry, is to blame for this equipment failure at Elandsrand.
&nbsp;<img height="148" alt="" src="" width="120" />
NUM President Senzeni Zokwana&nbsp; 

&ldquo;We suspect negligence. Because of continuous operations there is not time to make adequate checks,&rdquo; said NUM President Senzeni Zokwana, who also is President of the ICEM. &ldquo;Our members are dying, and will continue to die, until we change the culture of mining.&rdquo; 
 
The lesson from last week&rsquo;s Elandsrand mine, Zokwana told an American broadcast network, &ldquo;is that we need to put safety number one in planning, and make sure that at all times people can be saved quickly.&rdquo; Following the early morning accident on 3 October that trapped 3,000 men and 200 women at Elandsrand, Harmony Gold at first predicted rescue efforts would be completed by late that afternoon. It was not until 8 PM on 4 October when the last of the 3,200 came up the emergency shaft. 
 
&ldquo;We are very much concerned,&rdquo; said Zokwana. &ldquo;We believe that this should be a call to the industry that secondary exits underground be mandated.&rdquo; 
<img height="95" alt="" src="" width="100" />
NUM&rsquo;s chairperson of Health and Safety, Peter Bailey, repeated the need for mining houses to changes focus. &ldquo;When it comes to production targets, the companies make no mistakes in meeting them,&rdquo; he said. &ldquo;But when it comes to safety, we hear rhetoric and philosophy.&rdquo; 
 
In a 5 October Wall Street Journal article on the Elandsrand near disaster, ICEM General Secretary Manfred Warda said, &ldquo;There&rsquo;s a rush into the investment of mining in general,&rdquo; adding that quick development is difficult to manage, even for companies and countries with good safety records. 
 
In South Africa, the world&rsquo;s biggest producer of precious minerals, mining deaths so far in 2007 far outpace those of preceding years. The current death toll makes a 2003 promise by the industry of achieving zero workplace deaths by 2013 ring hollow. 
 
Only five days before Harmony&rsquo;s accident, four miners of AngloGold were killed due to a rock fall caused by seismic activity in the depths of the Mponeng mine, which is near the Elandsrand mine. And just yesterday, 7 October, the bodies of 23 miners, who were illegally mining a closed Harmony Gold shaft inside the Helena mine in Free State province, were pulled from deep underground. They perished after a fire ignited on 18 September. Harmony had been mining other shafts of the Helena mine. 
 
This past summer, the NUM called for an urgent tripartite meeting to resuscitate South Africa&rsquo;s Mining Health and Safety Summit in order to address the many current deficiencies in mine safety. Then, the NUM said mining houses must begin to &ldquo;walk the talk&rdquo; when it comes to implementing safe practices. In South Africa, following last week&rsquo;s Elandsrand accident near Carletonville along the country&rsquo;s gold belt, the time for action with a new culture, backed by capital improvements to health and safety techniques, has now fully risen to the surface.

Near Disaster at Harmony’s Elandsrand Gold Mine in South Africa Repeats Safety Call

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