By Enyichukwu Enemanna
No fewer than 31 illegal miners from neighbouring Lesotho have perished from a suspected gas explosion in a shuttered gold mine in South Africa, authorities announced on Friday.
This came days after residents reported the missing of their relatives and loved ones.
The national Department of Mineral and Energy Resources said in a statement that the search and rescue was delayed due to the high level of methane gas, considered to be dangerously high in the ventilation shaft where the miners are believed to have died.
According to the department, the mine located in the city of Welkom in the central Free State province was previously operated by South Africa’s largest gold-mining company but had been shut down in the 1990s.
The department, which is the government ministry responsible for mining, said it was still piecing together the details of the accident.
A spokesperson for Lesotho Prime Minister Sam Matekane said relatives of some miners had reported them missing, prompting Lesotho’s foreign ministry to contact South African authorities.
Local media reports that the miners are believed to have died in Shaft 5 of the Virginia mine on May 18.
Illegal mining is common in South Africa’s old gold-mining sites, where miners go into closed but often dangerous shafts to dig for any deposits left behind.
The mineral resources department said it had information that three bodies had been brought to the surface by other illegal miners but there were likely still dozens underground at the Welkom mine.
The latest deaths in Welkom sparked a diplomatic row Friday between South Africa and Lesotho over the issue of illegal miners coming over the nearby border.
“This incident, more than any other incident, has confirmed our view that this thing of illegal miners is economic sabotage,” South African Minister of Mineral Resources and Energy Gwede Mantashe said on TV station Newzroom Afrika, accusing Lesotho of not taking the issue of illegal miners seriously.
Thapelo Mabote, the spokesperson for Lesotho’s prime minister, responded that Mantashe’s allegations were “wrong and misplaced.”
