The bodies of 78 men have been recovered from a gold mine in South Africa, where police have been carrying out an operation against illegal mining.
A stand-off between police and illegal miners more than a mile underground at Stilfontein—93 miles southwest of Johannesburg—began in August 2024, and on Monday, the police launched an operation to bring out those below ground.
More than 1,100 people, many of them illegal immigrants, have been arrested since August 2024 for illegal mining.
In the past few days, it has emerged that there have been deaths underground, with activists blaming the police for cutting off food and water supplies.
The police had blocked food and water supplies since August 2024, but a court ruling in December 2024 said volunteers could send down essential aid for those underground.
On Monday, the authorities began to use a metal cage to recover men and dead bodies from the shaft, in an operation expected to last several days. Nine bodies were brought out on Monday, 51 on Tuesday, and another 18 on Wednesday.
The police have always maintained that the miners were not trapped and were free to leave but had refused for fear of being arrested, and in some cases deported.
However, the Democratic Alliance, the junior partner in the ruling coalition along with the African National Congress, called for an independent inquiry and said the situation at Stilfontein had gotten “badly out of hand.”
On Tuesday, South African Police Minister Senzo Mchunu told broadcaster eNCA: “We don’t know exactly how many people are remaining there. We are focusing on getting them, assisting them out.
‘Wilful Negligence’
On Wednesday, the South African Federation of Trade Unions said in a statement, “These miners, many of them undocumented and desperate workers from Mozambique and other southern African countries, were left to die in one of the most horrific displays of state wilful negligence in recent history.”Mannas Fourie, CEO of a private rescue organization involved in the operation, told Johannesburg’s Radio 702, “Even the illegal miners that are at the bottom, they’re quite keen to get into the cage, so we’re loading as many people as we can at one time and we bring them up to the surface.”
For decades, South Africa has battled illegal mining, which the government estimates costs it $1 billion a year in lost revenue.
There are an estimated 6,000 abandoned mines, hundreds of which have been reopened illegally by miners seeking to eke out a living.
The police operation at Stilfontein was part of a nationwide initiative against mining gangs known as “zama zamas,” meaning hustlers in the Zulu language.
In November 2024, South African Cabinet Minister Khumbudzo Ntshavheni said the government would not send assistance.
“We are not sending help to criminals. We are going to smoke them out. They will come out,” she said.
South African mining minister Gwede Mantashe has called illegal mining “a war on the economy.”
Hundreds of Illegal Miners Arrested
“Since Aug. 2024 to Jan. 12, 2025 ... over 1,576 illegal miners have been arrested before the extraction operation commenced,” SAPS said, noting that included 997 from Mozambique, 427 from Zimbabwe, 118 from Lesotho, and one from Malawi.
SAPS said 121 illegal miners had been deported and 46 had been convicted of illegal mining, trespassing, or contravening the country’s immigration laws.
It said that since December 2023, it had seized 640 kilograms (1,411 pounds) of gold-bearing material, 6.2 kilograms (13 pounds) of refined gold, and a cache of explosives, firearms, and cash totaling 52.49 million rand ($2.78 million).
