Thousands of South African gold miners are attempting to launch a multi-million dollar class lawsuit against three largest gold mining companies for alleged negligence that resulted in them contracting lung diseases.

Lawyers say the mining firms could face record damages if the court recognizes the miners’ case as a class action. This could be South Africa’s biggest-ever class action lawsuit with more than 25,000 miners seeking compensation from gold mining companies

Richard Spoor, a lawyer representing mostly former miners, told VOA “There are laws to protect miners and there have been laws to protect miners for over 100 years and those laws are very simple. They say ‘You may not expose workers to harmful quantities of dust’.”

In response, the mining companies have moved to create a working group to deal with the issue of occupational lung disease.