This, despite a court order handed down by the Gauteng High Court in Pretoria last weekend, instructing that the illegal miners underground be given humanitarian aid by emergency personnel.

Lawyers for Human Rights have, on behalf on the mining community, written to the Community Safety MEC and Police, asking that illegal miners be provided with food, water and medication.

Lawyers for Human Rights’ Thato Gaafane explains, ”We know that our courts are simply institutions of dispute resolutions and the primary duty is not to give police discretion of how to do their work. Our clients are also concerned with the interpretation and implementation of the interim court order.”

“We have seen that community rescue efforts were stopped and the police marked a significant area of the mining area as the shaft. So the court order in paragraph 3.3 does not prohibit the community or non-emergency personnel from being around the mine shaft and continuing with their rescue efforts,” says Gaafane.


--SABC--