A belated — and bloody — security response to the entrenched problem of illegal gold mining is not enough to stop it. Indeed, the danger now is that the SA Police Service (SAPS) reins in its anti-illegal mining Operation Vala Umgodi, judging that more negative publicity from further mine site actions would be too costly. This would come as a huge blow to the legal mining industry, which has for years urged the government to act against the illegal miners who, in areas such as the West Rand, make it extremely difficult for regulated mining companies to operate.
The problem with a purely security response to such a multifaceted problem is that, as with counterinsurgency fighting, it is difficult to distinguish the really bad guys from the rest, and so accusations of the use of indiscriminate force are almost inevitable. Furthermore, the police operation simply does not have the resources to cover all illegal mining sites across the country at the same time. As the Americans learnt to their cost in Vietnam, the minute a security operation is closed and attention and resources moved elsewhere, the problem returns. A cycle of never-ending, costly operations becomes exhausting, demoralising and ultimately unsustainable.
The scourge of illegal mining is systemic, made up of socioeconomic desperation and governance weakness, acting on a legacy of historic mining that has left more than 6,000 abandoned mines, many of them accessible, in populous regions of the country. The problem therefore requires a system-level response, rather than a purely tactical and operational one.
Together with the security effort, there are two other vital policy areas that must be addressed simultaneously. Like the three legs of a stool, the absence of one of these is enough for the entire initiative to fall over.
The second leg is the dismantling of the organised criminal networks that oversee illegal mining and facilitate the flow of illicit gold, for these are the shadow industry’s primary beneficiaries. That is both the criminal gangs or syndicates that are responsible for the grotesque violence and criminality in and around illegal mining areas, and the transnational networks — the money men — that launder the illicit gold through the major international gold hubs.
Fortunately, help is at hand. As is clear from the World Gold Council’s excellent 2024 report on artisanal and illegal mining, this is a global phenomenon and there are many international agencies and organisations — including Interpol, the World Customs Organisation and the UN Office on Drugs and Crime — that have the expertise and resources to assist us.
Furthermore, the amaBhungane Centre of Investigative Journalism has unearthed a trove of information on illegal gold mining networks in SA — the methodologies, company structures and key individuals involved. There is simply no good reason for the state not to act against these networks — and acting is necessary to reverse our greylisting by the Financial Action Task Force.
Without a source of criminal funding, or gang protection, or a money-laundering conduit through which to sell illegal gold, the serious criminal element of informal mining can be removed — allowing for the transition from illegal to artisanal mining.
This brings us to the third leg. Small-scale mining is unavoidable, whether in SA or elsewhere. Indeed, there are sound reasons for encouraging it, for many of our gold deposits cannot be economically mined by large-scale operations. If we are serious about ending illegal mining we must develop a regulated artisanal mining sector that offers now-illegal operators and miners a route to formality and legality.
SA does in fact have an Artisanal and Small-Scale Mining Policy. The final version was released in March 2022. Implementing it will require effort, including fundamental changes to our primary mining legislation, the Mineral & Petroleum Resources Development Act of 2002. However, three years have now passed without real progress.
It is neither equitable nor practicable to target desperate people who have no viable alternative to the high-risk pursuit of illegal mining. Developing an artisanal alternative — one with health and safety safeguards, environmental protections and tax contributions — should be where we place our most urgent efforts right now.
When there is an available legal alterative those who choose not to adopt it can then properly be regarded as “criminal” and ripe for police action.
• Gordon is an executive director of conflict resolution consultancy Concentric Alliance.
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