Source: Agencies
17 GOLD MINERS TRAPPED A MILE UNDERGROUND
JOHANNESBURG - South African gold producer
Harmony Gold launched a rescue operation on Wednesday to free 17 miners
trapped a mile underground by a fire and rockfall at its Doornkop mine
near Johannesburg. 
The company said it had made
contact with eight miners who had managed to flee to a refuge bay at a
depth of 1,700 metres but the whereabouts of the remaining nine was
unknown.“The priority is simultaneously to get the fire under control and to reach the eight that are in the refuge bay and to find the nine who are still unaccounted for,” Harmony spokesman James Duncan said.
“As far as we know the eight that are in the refuge bay are fine.” Emergency teams had been sent underground but were struggling to get to the area because of smoke and a subsequent rockfall, he added.
Chief executive Graham Briggs cancelled a
presentation he had been due to give at a major industry conference in
Cape Town in order to fly to Johannesburg to oversee the rescue effort. Normal mining operations had been suspended.South Africa’s gold mines are the deepest in the world and ranked as some of the most dangerous during the apartheid years.
Since the end of
white-minority rule in 1994 the government, unions and companies have
worked hard to improve safety, but 112 people were still killed in the
mines in 2012, the last full year for which records are available.At least 82 men thought to have been illegal miners died after an underground fire at a Harmony mine in 2009. Most of the victims are believed to have died of suffocation.
All miners carry emergency oxygen packs and rescue bays are equipped with food, water and breathing equipments.
RACIAL DIVIDE CONTINUING IN S. AFRICA
The income of white South African households is six times higher than black ones, new census figures reveal.
President Jacob Zuma said the census showed the black
majority is still at the "bottom of the rung", 18 years after white
minority rule ended.
The statistics showed that while the income of black
households had increased by nearly 170% in the last decade, they still
earned the least.
The population now stands at nearly 52 million, 79% of whom are black people.It has risen by seven million since 2001.
The 2011 census statistics showed that children below the age of five
number nearly 11 million, making them the largest age group.
"It could be that HIV [infection] rates have levelled out and fertility
has begun to recover," said Statistics South Africa's demographic
analysis executive director, Diego Iturralde.
The average annual income of a white household is about 365,000 rand
($42,000; £26,000), followed by Indians at 251,000 rand, people of mixed
race at 251,500 rand and blacks at 60,600 rand, it showed.
Other key findings include:
- Nearly 30% of the labour force is unemployed
- More than three million children (nearly 4%) are orphans
- More than nine million people live in homes while the number of shack-dwellers has risen since 2001 to nearly two million
- The number of homes with flush toilets has increased from 50% in 2001 to 57%
- The number of people who have completed higher education has increased to 11.8%, from 8.4% in 2001
- The number of homes with electricity has increased from 58.2% in 1996 to 84.7% in 2011
- Paraffin is the main energy source at 7.5% of all homes
- Mobile phone ownership has increased from less than 32% a decade ago to nearly 90%.
Mr Zuma said the census showed that while "great strides" have been made since racial segregation ended in 1994, much still needed to be done to end inequality.
"These figures tell us that at the bottom of the rung is the
black majority who continue to be confronted by deep poverty,
unemployment and inequality, despite the progress that we have made
since 1994," he said.
"Much remains to be done to further improve the livelihoods
of our people especially in terms of significant disparities that still
exist between the rich and poor."
Mr Zuma pledged that by 2030 the African National Congress
(ANC) government would make sure that each community had a clinic,
school, library and police station.
Source: BBC
VISITORS GEOFLAGS SINCE AUGUST 26, 2009
