HARARE, Feb 15, 2019 (BSS/AFP) – At least 60 suspected illegal gold miners were feared dead in Zimbabwe on Friday after water flooded two disused shafts in a mining town southwest of Harare, government said.
“Following the flooding of the mine shafts …. on the 12th of February, 2019, where an estimated 60 – 70 artisanal miners are trapped,” the President Emmerson Mnangagwa, has declared a “state of disaster”, the minister of local government July Moyo said in a statement.
A government mining engineer Michael Munodawafa told AFP outside the mine that “hope of finding anyone alive is very slim since its happened Tuesday night into Wednesday morning, its almost over 24 hours.”
Rescuers were trying to use pumps to extract water in the search for survivors and bodies at the site near the town of Kadoma.
“The mine shaft was flooded by water from a dam wall which burst due to heavy rains on Tuesday night,” Wilson Gwatiringa, spokesman for mining company RioZim, owners of one of the mines, said.
“One of them is our mine which was no longer in operation. We are assisting on humanitarian grounds.”
The state-owned Herald newspaper said the other mine was privately owned.
District administrator Fortunate Muzulu said the illegal miners entered the shafts at night to evade the owners.
Zimbabwe has valuable platinum, diamond, gold, coal and copper deposits.
Mines account for a large portion of Zimbabwe’s economy, which was projected to have grown 6.8 percent in 2018, according to government officials. — NNN-AGENCIES
