{"id":13734,"date":"2012-08-22T03:04:30","date_gmt":"2012-08-22T01:04:30","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/08\/update-2-lonmin-fears-sackings-could-re-ignite-s-africa-violence\/"},"modified":"2012-08-22T03:04:30","modified_gmt":"2012-08-22T01:04:30","slug":"update-2-lonmin-fears-sackings-could-re-ignite-s-africa-violence","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/update-2-lonmin-fears-sackings-could-re-ignite-s-africa-violence\/","title":{"rendered":"UPDATE 2-Lonmin fears sackings could re-ignite S. Africa violence"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>\t\t<span><\/span><\/p>\n<p>* Deadly precedent set in previous sackings<span><\/span><\/p>\n<p><span><\/span><\/p>\n<p>* Company may issue new shares to shore up finances<\/p>\n<p><span><\/span><\/p>\n<p>By Sherilee Lakmidas<\/p>\n<p><span><\/span><\/p>\n<p>JOHANNESBURG, Aug 21 (Reuters) &#8211; The world&#8217;s third-biggest<br \/>\nplatinum producer, South Africa&#8217;s Lonmin, on Tuesday backed down<br \/>\nfrom its threat to sack 3,000 striking mine workers, fearing the<br \/>\nmove could provoke more violence after police last week shot<br \/>\ndead 34 miners in scenes reminiscent of apartheid bloodshed.<\/p>\n<p><span><\/span><\/p>\n<p>Most of the strikers, who faced a Tuesday ultimatum to<br \/>\nreturn, stayed off the job as police helicopters hovered over<br \/>\nLonmin&#8217;s  Marikana mine, about 100 km (60 miles)<br \/>\nnorthwest of Johannesburg.<\/p>\n<p><span><\/span><\/p>\n<p>Hit by lost production and revenues, the company said it may<br \/>\nissue new shares &#8220;to strengthen its financial<br \/>\nstructure&#8221;.<\/p>\n<p><span><\/span><\/p>\n<p>Analysts have speculated the company may turn to<br \/>\nshareholders to raise new capital as it will reach its borrowing<br \/>\nlimits at the end of next month.<\/p>\n<p><span><\/span><\/p>\n<p>Lonmin said about a third of its 28,000 workers at the<br \/>\nMarikana mine had returned to work. It had previously threatened<br \/>\nemployees with immediate dismissal for ignoring its ultimatum.<\/p>\n<p><span><\/span><\/p>\n<p>The 3,000 strikers are mostly rock drill operators, who say<br \/>\nthey should be paid more for their arduous underground work.<br \/>\n\u00a0 <span class=\"label\"><strong>Continued&#8230;<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n<p><span><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>* Deadly precedent set in previous sackings * Company may issue new shares to shore up finances By Sherilee Lakmidas JOHANNESBURG, Aug 21 (Reuters) &#8211; The world&#8217;s third-biggest platinum producer, South Africa&#8217;s Lonmin, on Tuesday backed down from its threat to sack 3,000 striking mine workers, fearing the move could provoke more violence after police [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[1],"tags":[830,2370,183],"class_list":{"0":"post-13734","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-south-africa","7":"tag-news","8":"tag-reuters","9":"tag-south-africa-2","10":"entry"},"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13734","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=13734"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13734\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=13734"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=13734"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=13734"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}