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Cape Town – About 1 600 miners who spent nearly 48 hours over 2km below the surface of Harmony Gold’s [JSE:HAR] Kusasalethu mine during an illegal sit-in returned to the surface late on Thursday night.
Union leaders were brought in to resolve the matter and a number of demands were given to management.
Harmony Gold said in a statement on Friday that all employees safely returned to surface at the mine near Carletonville.
“Employees returned to surface shortly before 12:00 last night following all-night discussions between management and union leadership,” it said.
“A thorough independent investigation into the circumstances surrounding the illegal sit-in, which lasted nearly 48 hours, will be conducted. Production at the mine will proceed over the weekend.”
Harmony CEO Peter Steenkamp said: “We are pleased that a resolution has been reached and that all our employees have returned to surface safely.”
Harmony Gold, whose three-year wage agreement with labour unions expires in 2018, has been ramping up production so that it can halt mining in five years.
"We’re now looking at harvesting the mine in the next five years," CEO Peter Steenkamp said in August, Bloomberg reported.
“Harmony has been trying to turn around performance at Kusasalethu, which employs about 4 500 people, for at least the last three years as the company battled low grades, fires, illegal mining and labour disruptions,” Bloomberg explained.
Harmony Gold traded 2.31% higher at R33.20 at the close of markets.
