By KEDIBONE MOLAETSI
16 November 2024- North West MEC for Community Safety and Transport Management, Wessels Morweng, hit the ground running by convening a meeting with relevant stakeholders that forms part of the rescue team established by the Minister of Police, Senzo Mchunu. This comes after Mchunu appointed Morweng to chair the rescue team, which is to be responsible for developing a comprehensive rescue plan to assist in bringing the illegal miners to the surface.
On Friday, Mchunu, Deputy Minister Cassel Mathale, North West Premier, Lazarus Mokgosi, Morweng embarked on an oversight visit to the Stilfontein shaft, where more than 1000 illegal miners have been rescued. In the meeting, Morweng requested the mine owners and rescue specialists to work on conducting the assessment, which will inform the operational plan to rescue those underground.
“We all agree that we want to rescue those people and we need the community to come on board for us to succeed in this operation. The mine owners indicated that there is a need to clear the site before any resource can be deployed on site, which they committed to implement immediately when the community members have vacated the area.
“We then made a plea to the community leaders who are part of the rescue team to start communicating with the members on site about the intentions of the government and those underground if they are able to. We need to allow the technical rescue team to make the proper risk assessment that will inform this operational plan,” he said.
Morweng further said their common ground here is to rescue those people. He added that the earlier they talk to community members on site and allow the mine owners and technical rescue team to clear the site and deploy relevant machinery to do the risk assessment, the better.
“They need to start to operationalise the plan. The rescue team led by me, composed of SAPS, District Mayor and Local Mayor, community leaders, mine owners, mine rescue technical team and government departments,” said Morweng.
Meanwhile, there was allegedly an impasse between government departments in terms of who would foot the bill as the rescue team demanded answers before they could commence with their duty.
The Guardian 