Cracks emerge as miners face lure of media gold

For 69 days, the solidarity of the trapped Chilean miners enabled them to survive their subterranean prison, solemnly vowing to maintain a silence about their experience once confronted by the media circus that awaited them above.

Less than a week after their deliverance, cracks are beginning to emerge in that unity forged underground.

Amid offers of free holidays to Greece and tickets to see Manchester United and Real Madrid, "Los 33" have started speaking about their ordeal, with some openly requesting money in return for interviews with the sizeable phalanx of broadcasters and journalists that remains at the San Jose mine and the nearby city of Copiapo, where many of the miners live.

Quite where the opening of bidding for interviews sits with a reported agreement between the men to split evenly the proceeds from the telling of their stories - in particular the first 17 days of their captivity - is not clear.

But as the heroes of Chile began to be released from hospital over the weekend, a market was rapidly developing for access to the miners whose entombment captivated a global audience of one billion.

Veronica Quispe, the wife of Carlos Mamani, 24, the Bolivian national who was the only non-Chilean in the group, told reporters arriving at their home in a slum in Copiapo that they were charging for interviews.

She told the New York Times: "We're poor - look at the place we live. You live off our stories, so why can't we make money from this opportunity to feed our children?"

The going price for an audience with one of the 33 varies dramatically. The partner of one miner asked for a bottle of Argentine alcohol while some miners have requested only US$4 ($5.30). Others, however, are asking for substantially more, with figures of US$25,000 being discussed by some families.

The Mail on Sunday published an exhaustive account from Mario Sepulveda, the flamboyant machine operator who led rescuers in a chorus of singing when he became the second to emerge from the escape capsule six days ago.

The newspaper said Sepulveda, known as "Super Mario", had granted the interview because of what he described as the "dignity and kindness" with which the paper had treated his family. Other media groups are willing to go further, with broadcasters, magazines and newspapers offering to fly miners to Italy, Japan and America.

The US broadcaster ABC News said it had obtained an exclusive interview with Sepulveda but denied it had paid for access, saying instead that it had "licensed material from the family".

The compelling nature of the narrative of the group, in particular those first 17 days when the miners had no idea whether they would be found and eked out meagre rations in darkness, means there is intense pressure on the men and their pact to keep some elements of their experience private.

Negotiations for interviews even began while the group were still underground with tentative offers made via letters sent down a plastic tube.

The material compensations for their physical and mental traumas are already being provided to the men. A Chilean mining magnate, Leonardo Farkas, has written a cheque for 5 million pesos ($13,760) to each of the miners, while a Greek mining firm has offered a free one-week holiday to each man and a companion.

But with film rights reaching as much as $630,000 per miner and television rights $12,600, the most substantial sums lie in the details of what took place below ground.

- INDEPENDENT