JOHANNESBURG – Workers at the doomed Lily gold mine in Barberton, Mpumalanga, have been informed that they may begin to apply for voluntary severance packages as the mine had no money to pay their salaries yet, trade union Solidarity said on Thursday.

According to Solidarity, a business rescue practitioner advised the workers on Wednesday night, citing operational reasons and a lack of funding as reasons for this.

Lily mine, owned by Vantage Goldfields, was placed under business rescue administration following a major collapse that led to three workers being trapped underground, and the subsequent closure of the mine.

Solidarity general secretary, Gideon du Plessis, in a statement said the necessary funding to pay the workers’ salaries for April and May, or any of their outstanding overtime and allowances, had not yet been secured.

“The result is that the workers applying for voluntary packages do so on condition that they will only receive their outstanding salaries once the necessary funding has been obtained, but that the payment of the retrenchment package might only take place in a year’s time when the mine is back in production,” Du Plessis said.

Du Plessis also said that the uncertainty, frustration and grave financial hardship had contributed to many workers now applying for voluntary severance packages in order to get access to unemployment allowances and their pension money.

Du Plessis said this was the only way the workers could get some certainty about their future.

“Ever since the mining accident on 5 February, workers had to listen to the false promises made by management and politicians, none of which realised. This is especially true of the top management of Lily Mine who created false hope, while Solidarity Helping Hand had to supply food parcels to the workers so that they could survive,” Du Plessis said.

The trade union once again requested the Industrial Development Corporation (IDC) and Sasfin to give favourable consideration to the loan applications for Lily Mine’s salary and capital project funding.

Du Plessis said a large number of jobs might still be saved if the necessary funding was appropriated to sink a new shaft and to finance the other part of the company’s mining operations that had not been affected by the mining disaster and where new job opportunities could be created.

Three workers – Yvonne Mnisi, Pretty Mabuza, 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 February 5. They have not yet been recovered.