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Lovemore Zigara, Midlands Correspondent
THE Zimbabwe Diamond and Allied Minerals Workers Union (ZDAMWU) has challenged Government to involve workers in boards that regulate licensing of investors.
ZDAMWU secretary general, Mr Justine Chinhema, said having workers’ representatives on regulatory bodies would ensure the welfare of workers and safety is guaranteed especially in the mining sector.
“As a trade union that represents the interests of mining workers, we are calling on the Government to include workers in boards that regulate investor licensing.
“This is very critical and soon we will be pushing for the minimum standards of safety and health,” he said.
“We have already engaged NSSA on this and we hope they will be imposing stiff penalties on employers who violate safety regulations. We also want this criminalised to safeguard the workers and such employers should be convicted for manslaughter,” added Mr Chinhema.
The mining workers representative body said it was also pushing for the establishment of a regulatory body which will have board members from NSSA to certify new mining investments to cater for minimum safety standards before operations can start.
“We are also advocating for a board through NSSA to make sure minimum standards that would say ‘before a mine is opened for operations, it should be inspected by NSSA and the workers body to certify if it is fit for operations to commence’,” Mr Chinhema said.
He said enforcement of minimum safety standards in the mining sector would save workers from accidents.
There has been a number of mining related accidents in the local mining sector which have mainly been attributed to small scale miners in the gold and chrome mining subsectors.
However, a number of large scale operations have also not been spared from mining related mishaps. — @lavuzigara1
Online Reporter