Australian mining giant 'delaying' business rescue

South African trade union Solidarity has claimed business rescue practitioners (BRPs) are being ‘captured’ by an Australian mining company to delay the rescue process. The trade union’s general secretary, Gideon du Plessis, has written to the BRPs of Lily and Barbrook mines, slamming them for allowing the delay in the rescue process of the mines. City Press reports that it noted that after losing five cases already, Vantage Goldfields approached the Gauteng High Court for further litigation last week. Vantage Goldfields has been fighting tooth and nail over the past seven years not to sell the mines after they were shut down and put under business rescue following a disaster that cost the lives of three employees. An entrance to Lily Mine caved in on 5 February 2016 and three workers died. In his letter to BRP Rob Devereux, Du Plessis said ‘it serves no purpose to detail the reasons for the failure of these proposals, but we are concerned that there are common factors in all of them, specifically with respect to the alleged delaying actions by the Vantage Goldfield management and shareholders, seemingly with assistance from yourselves’. Vantage Goldfields approached the High Court last week to compel the BRPs to implement originally adopted plans.