Former gold miners in South Africa can go ahead with a class action against mining companies over health damage allegedly caused by their work, a court in Johannesburg has ruled.<\/p>\n
The high court decision paves the way for what would become the largest class action in South African history.<\/p>\n
The ex-miners say they contracted silicosis, an incurable lung disease, after years of working in the mines.<\/p>\n
The court said that a class action was “the only realistic option”.<\/p>\n
Judge Phineas Mojapelo’s decision could lead to a court case lasting up to 10 years, the BBC’s Nomsa Maseko reports from Johannesburg.<\/p>\n
But the former miners are still hopeful that the case could help improve their lives as well as those of their families, our reporter says.<\/p>\n
Among the defendants in the case are Anglo American, AngloGold Ashanti, Gold Fields, Harmony Gold, Sibanye Gold and African Rainbow Minerals, the Reuters news agency reports.<\/p>\n
Miners have long campaigned for compensation for the health damage allegedly caused by their work<\/span><\/p>\n The lawyers representing the miners believe this court ruling marks the first step towards justice.<\/p>\n Most of the miners who allegedly contracted silicosis while working underground have been unable to work for many years, dependent on government grants for a living.<\/p>\n The claims, going back decades, also involve former miners from neighbouring countries such as Lesotho.<\/p>\n One of the companies in this case, Anglo American, reached a $30m (\u00a321m) suit with 400 miners in a separate silicosis case.<\/p>\n It is not clear if this class action will be settled out of court, but for the miners who say they have waited for too long, a speedy resolution would be a form of justice.<\/p>\n Silicosis, caused by inhaling the silica dust in gold-bearing rocks, can lead to breathing difficulties, regular coughing and chest pains, and it can also lead to tuberculosis.<\/p>\n Gold mining has played a central role in South Africa’s history, with Johannesburg, its largest city, being built on the gold reefs.<\/p>\n But in recent years, its contribution to the economy has declined with the metal contributing 1.7% to GDP in 2013, according to Statistics South Africa,<\/p>\n –<\/p>\n Source: BBC<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Former gold miners in South Africa can go ahead with a class action against mining companies over health damage allegedly caused by their work, a court in Johannesburg has ruled. The high court decision paves the way for what would become the largest class action in South African history. The ex-miners say they contracted silicosis, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":14,"featured_media":214010,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jnews-multi-image_gallery":[],"jnews_single_post":[],"jnews_primary_category":[],"jnews_social_meta":[],"jnews_override_counter":[],"footnotes":""},"categories":[107],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-214007","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-international"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/citifmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/214007","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/citifmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/citifmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/citifmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/14"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/citifmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=214007"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/citifmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/214007\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/citifmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/214010"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/citifmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=214007"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/citifmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=214007"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/citifmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=214007"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}