20 November, 2024With over 4,000 artisanal miners stranded underground at an abandoned gold mine in Stilfontein, the formalization of artisanal and small-scale mining (ASM) has ignited debates in South Africa.
The police said they are waiting to arrest the artisanal miners as soon as they surface to the ground as has happened to over 1000 miners. However, some were rescued using a rope pulley system – dehydrated and emaciated while a decomposed body was retrieved from the mine. Most of the artisanal miners are from Lesotho, Mozambique, and Zimbabwe and work alongside former South African mineworkers.
As part of Vala umgodi - Isizulu for close the holes – which targeted illegal mining, the police sealed entrances to the shaft trapping the miners who are also known as Zama-Zamas. With police presence, water and food supplies were cut off from reaching underground.
In response to appeals to send help to the underground miners by communities, minister in the presidency, Khumbudzo Ntshaveni said that the government will not rescue the “criminals.” She added that: “We are going to smoke them out; they will come out.”
The statement was met with outcries from trade unions, human rights organizations, and community groups. However, a court order ruled that the government had a responsibility to protect human rights under the constitution, and to provide water and food to the miners.
Mine rescue teams are now at the mine site to assist with rescue operations.
In a statement the Alternative Mining Indaba (AMI) said:
“It is disheartening that in a constitutional democracy like South Africa, atrocities of this nature persist despite the country’s painful history of violent land dispossession and racial economic exploitation under apartheid. The current impasse marked by the aggressive presence of law enforcement fails to address the root causes driving people to risk their lives in abandoned mines.” The AMI says there are over 6,000 abandoned mines in South Africa which can be mined to support livelihoods for communities.
Phillip Mankge, the National Union of Mineworkers (NUM), acting deputy general secretary said:
“As NUM we would like to put it categorically clear that we don’t support the statement. In fact, it is inhumane and irresponsible of the minister to utter such words when people are trapped underground.”
According to reports, artisanal miners dig gold worth over $8 million dollars per year. This gold is sold to markets in Switzerland and the United Arab Emirates.
The OECD Due Diligence Guidance for Responsible Supply Chains of Minerals from Conflict Affected and High Risk Areas is applicable to South Africa considering the violence associated with ASM, as mining companies and their agents are buying gold from artisanal miners. Research and court cases have confirmed that heavily armed gangs and illegal mining bosses act as fronts for licensed buyers at national and international levels. Several Zama Zamas have been killed in turf wars between rival gangs, there have been shootouts between police and mine security, and cases of rape have been reported against them.
The NUM, an IndustriALL affiliate, said policy gaps on ASM have created situations in which artisanal mining is done by criminal syndicates.
Kopano Konopi, the Congress of South African Trade Unions (COSATU) provincial secretary for North West, where the mine is located, said:
“COSATU believes the government should relook at the country’s mining policies, because the product produced by the so-called illegal miners finds a way into the market even though it is procured from them cheaply. Government should explore issuing artisanal mining licences to small-scale miners and cooperatives.”
“There are models that can be adopted for ASM in South Africa including implementing existing policies by the department of mineral resources. ASM must be formalized in ways that consider the country’s socio-economic conditions of high unemployment and poverty. Mining should not be only for multinational corporations but must benefit former mineworkers and communities as well,”
said Glen Mpufane IndustriALL mining director.
He further emphasized the recommendations in the African Mining Vision which states that positive benefits can be derived from ASM including sustainable livelihoods and poverty reduction.