Former mineworkers of the collapsed Lily Mine outside Barberton in Mpumalanga say they are making progress in finding their three colleagues who were buried in 2016 when the mine collapsed. 

Pretty Nkambule, Solomon Nyarenda and Yvonne Mnisi disappeared on February 5  2016 when the container they were working in plunged downwards when the mine collapsed. 

After the mine collapse, 76 employees on duty that day were rescued through a shaft window while the container with the three disappeared. 

Rescue missions and recovery missions were abandoned after the soil proved unstable and collapsed again and the mine owner, Gold Fields, later said it had no money to continue with any recovery actions. 

Former employees, community members and the families of the three miners have been camping outside the mine gate since April 30 this year. 

“We are seeing a progress, we have reached level four underground and we managed to find machines that we left underground," said spokesperson of the former employees, Harry Mazibuko.

"Surprisingly on the 26th we managed to see one of the tyres which supported the container where our colleagues were working. But for now we can’t continue because we need to go out and raise funds to buy a net and get pillars to stop the collapsing ground. 

"In no time we will announce something good in terms of recovering the three colleagues. We are hopeful. No government help or mine help, we are doing this whatever it costs,”  Mazibuko said.  

Elmon Mnisi, the father of Yvonne Mnisi, told Sowetan they support the intervention by community members.

“Whatever is bringing us close to get the bones of our children we support. These young men and women have been asked by us as families because we can see the mine owners and government are not interested to find our children,” said Mnisi.