The latest deaths near Rustenburg have again exposed the dangers of illegal mining. But beneath the familiar images of men emerging from abandoned shafts lies a far more complex criminal economy involving buyers, financiers, suppliers, corrupt facilitators and networks that can extend beyond South Africa’s borders.
By Staff Reporter
Fourteen suspected illegal miners were killed after an excavation collapsed at the Nkaneng dumping site near Rustenburg in the North West earlier this month. Eight others were injured, while police continued searching the site amid concerns that more people could have been trapped.
Most of those who died were believed to be nationals of Lesotho.
The deaths brought the dangers of illegal mining into sharp focus again: unstable workings, inadequate safety equipment and men prepared to spend days underground in search of valuable minerals.
But the latest tragedy also points to a question that has become increasingly difficult to avoid.
What happens to the illegal mining industry if the people at the bottom of it are arrested, deported or killed, but the networks above them remain intact?
South Africa’s illegal mining problem has expanded beyond the traditional image of individual miners entering abandoned gold shafts in search of a living. Authorities and the mining industry increasingly describe a criminal economy involving organised groups, weapons, processing operations, mineral buyers and cross-border networks.
The Minerals Council South Africa describes illegal mining as a serious threat to the formal mining industry. It says organised criminal groups have become increasingly involved in the illicit extraction and movement of minerals.
That distinction is important because the person found underground is not necessarily the person controlling the operation.
The men at the bottom
The term zama zama has become shorthand for illegal miners, but it covers people occupying very different positions within the illegal mining economy.
Some enter abandoned workings seeking income in communities where formal employment opportunities are scarce. Others operate within criminal networks that control access to underground workings, provide equipment and security, determine where minerals are sold and take a share of the proceeds.
The conditions underground can be brutal.
Miners can spend prolonged periods below the surface, often without the ventilation, structural support, rescue capacity and other safety systems available in regulated mines. The Rustenburg deaths are the latest reminder of the consequences.
In March, an Al Jazeera investigation documented the experiences of men working as much as 1,500 metres underground in South African gold workings, illustrating the physical isolation and dangers associated with illegal mining.
The miners therefore occupy a contradictory position. They are participants in an illegal industry, but some are also workers operating at the most dangerous end of a much larger supply chain.
The Minerals Council puts the distinction more directly: “Illegal mining is not a survivalist activity conducted by desperate individuals alone. It is an organised criminal enterprise run by sophisticated syndicates that extend from local gangs to international trading networks. The foot soldiers underground take all the physical risks, while the massive economic profits flow up to syndicate leaders and illicit global buyers.”
That structure changes the nature of the enforcement challenge.
Five levels above the shaft
The Hawks have previously described illegal mining as a five-tier operation.
At the first level are the miners underground. Above them are local gang leaders and security providers. The next level includes regional buyers and processing plants, followed by national bulk buyers. At the highest level are international syndicates involved in exporting gold into global markets.
The significance of the structure is straightforward: the person carrying a bag of ore out of a shaft may be several layers removed from the person who ultimately controls the money.
It also explains why arrests at mining sites do not necessarily bring an operation to an end.
The National Prosecuting Authority has previously made the same point: “When we only arrest the miners found at the site, we are treating the symptoms, not the disease. Until law enforcement successfully targets the syndicate bosses, the money launderers, and the corrupt officials who facilitate access and equipment, new workers will simply be recruited to replace those who are deported or imprisoned.”
For investigators, the question therefore extends beyond the shaft.
Who owns or controls the equipment?
Who supplies food and other necessities to workers underground?
Who provides firearms?
Who processes the material once it reaches the surface?
Who purchases it?
And how does the money move?
The business above ground
Hennie van Vuuren, director of Open Secrets, argues that the financial side of the industry deserves considerably more attention. “To focus solely on the people emerging from disused shafts is to miss the entire financial architecture of this crime. The real money isn’t made underground; it is made in elite office parks, through illicit financial flows, international refineries and corrupt supply chains that move illegally extracted minerals out of the country.”
That financial chain is harder to see than a police operation at a mine.
A raid produces arrests, weapons, photographs and footage of miners being brought to the surface. Financial investigations are slower and less visible. They involve tracing payments, identifying companies and intermediaries, examining ownership structures and establishing the movement of minerals and money across jurisdictions.
Yet that is where investigators can potentially reach the people who cannot simply be replaced when an operation is disrupted.
The Minerals Council has warned that illegal mining and organised crime are increasingly intertwined and has called for action against both the supply and demand sides of the illicit trade.
The cost to the economy
The scale of the illegal mining economy is reflected in the money being lost outside the formal economy.
Mineral and Petroleum Resources Minister Gwede Mantashe said in January 2025 that illegal mining had cost South Africa at least R60 billion in 2024. A subsequent PwC SA Mine 2025 report estimated the value of illegal mining at about R60 billion in 2025, compared with approximately R7 billion in 2017.
The figure does not capture the full cost of the crisis.
South Africa also faces the continuing financial burden of securing and rehabilitating abandoned and ownerless mines. A 2026 assessment estimated that the country has about 6,100 abandoned mines, with rehabilitation liabilities of approximately R46 billion.
The economic damage therefore extends beyond the value of minerals extracted illegally. It includes the cost of enforcement, environmental damage and the rehabilitation of mining infrastructure, which can remain a liability long after formal operations have ended.
For taxpayers, the consequences can continue long after the gold has left the mine.
Violence beyond the mine
The consequences of illegal mining are not restricted to the people working underground.
Communities surrounding mining areas can be exposed to armed groups competing for control of underground workings and access to mineral deposits. Illegal mining has also been associated with extortion, intimidation, firearms offences and violence between rival groups.
David van Wyk, lead researcher at the Bench Marks Foundation, argues that the public focus often settles on the most visible participants.
“The government and media focus on the armed young men coming out of the ground because it is visual and easy to police. But who is supplying the military-grade weapons? Who is supplying the heavy processing equipment, the mercury and the food? These miners are exploited labourers for powerful syndicates that include international buyers and corrupt elements within both the private sector and law enforcement.”
The allegations contained in that assessment point towards a much broader investigative task.
If organised operations are able to sustain people underground for extended periods, someone has to provide the logistics.
If miners have access to firearms, someone has to supply them.
If material is being processed and sold, someone has to purchase it.
And if the proceeds are entering the legitimate economy, there has to be a mechanism for moving and disguising the money.
A market that keeps the industry alive
The existence of buyers is one of the central features of the illegal mining economy.
Minerals extracted illegally still have to enter a market before they can generate significant profits.
That can involve local buyers, processing operations, intermediaries and larger trading networks. At each stage, the material can become further removed from the person who extracted it.
This makes the investigation of illegal mining different from a conventional policing operation.
Removing workers from a shaft may prevent them from extracting minerals that day.
Identifying and disrupting the people purchasing those minerals can affect the economics of the operation itself.
The difference is between interrupting an activity and dismantling a business.
The formalisation dilemma
The scale of the problem has also renewed debate over whether some forms of informal mining should be brought into the legal economy.
There is a distinction between genuine artisanal and small-scale mining and operations controlled by criminal syndicates.
Formalisation could create legal opportunities for miners who are capable of operating within a regulated framework. But the model becomes considerably more difficult when applied to deep-level abandoned gold workings.
Many of South Africa’s old mines require sophisticated ventilation, pumping, geological management, structural maintenance and emergency systems.
A permit does not solve those technical challenges.
Nor does it remove criminal networks.
Formalising an individual miner does not automatically disarm an armed group, identify the people financing an operation or break the market through which illegally extracted minerals are sold.
The distinction has become particularly relevant following the Rustenburg deaths. Parliament’s Portfolio Committee on Mineral and Petroleum Resources described the deaths as a reminder of the dangers surrounding illegal mining, while also calling for lawful opportunities for artisanal and small-scale miners alongside enforcement of health, safety and environmental regulations.
The challenge is determining where legitimate small-scale mining ends and organised criminal mining begins.
The abandoned-mine problem
Behind much of the illegal mining debate sits another problem: the legacy of mine closures.
South Africa has thousands of abandoned mines, creating a significant challenge for rehabilitation, environmental management and security.
An unsecured shaft does not simply become irrelevant when a mine closes.
It can remain physically accessible, contain valuable deposits and provide the infrastructure around which an illegal operation can develop.
The result is an enduring liability.
Mining companies may have ceased production, but the shafts remain. Communities remain nearby. Environmental risks remain. And when illegal mining takes place, the state may ultimately have to deal with the security, environmental and social consequences.
The environmental cost
There is also a less visible casualty of illegal mining: the environment.
Unregulated mineral processing can contaminate soil and water with toxic substances and heavy metals, while disturbed land and unstable underground workings can create hazards long after miners have moved on.
Research published in 2025 found significant environmental implications associated with organised illegal and informal mining in South Africa, including pollution affecting water, land and air.
For communities living near mining areas, the consequences can extend well beyond the immediate presence of illegal miners.
A contaminated water source does not disappear when a police operation ends. An unstable shaft does not become safe because the people working in it have been arrested. And environmental rehabilitation does not happen simply because an abandoned mine has been declared closed.
The country can therefore suffer a double loss: mineral wealth is removed from the formal economy while the environmental damage associated with its extraction can create another financial liability.
The eventual cost of repairing that damage can fall on the state and, ultimately, taxpayers.
Enforcement on an industrial scale
The state has substantially increased its enforcement response through Operation Vala Umgodi, launched in December 2023 to combat illegal mining.
The operation has produced large numbers of arrests and seizures. Police said in 2025 that Vala Umgodi had resulted in more than 27,000 arrests, while soldiers have subsequently been deployed to support operations in several provinces.
In July 2026, more than 200 people were arrested during another crackdown, illustrating the continued scale of enforcement activity.
Parliament’s Portfolio Committee on Mineral and Petroleum Resources has described illegal mining as nationally co-ordinated organised crime requiring a sustained, intelligence-driven and multi-agency response.
The scale of the operations raises a further question for law enforcement: what happens after the arrests?
If workers are removed but the people supplying them, financing them and buying their minerals remain in business, the supply of labour can simply be replenished.
That is why the financial and organisational investigation is becoming as important as the operation at the mine itself.
The border question
Illegal mining also has a cross-border dimension.
The Rustenburg deaths again highlighted this reality, with police saying most of those killed were believed to be nationals of Lesotho.
But nationality and criminality cannot be treated as interchangeable.
People cross Southern African borders for work and other legitimate reasons. Criminal networks can also exploit weaknesses in border management and immigration enforcement.
For investigators, the task is to distinguish between the two.
That requires co-operation between South Africa and neighbouring countries, intelligence sharing and investigations capable of identifying criminal networks rather than treating migration itself as evidence of organised crime.
What happens after the cameras leave?
Illegal mining has repeatedly returned to the national agenda after deaths, major police operations and confrontations at abandoned mines.
The latest Rustenburg collapse has again brought the issue into sharp focus.
The immediate questions are familiar: how many people died, how many remain trapped, who operated the site and whether the mine was properly secured.
The larger investigation is more difficult.
It requires tracing the route from the person underground to the person who purchases the mineral. It requires identifying the people supplying equipment and weapons. It requires examining financial flows and investigating possible corruption where evidence exists. It requires determining who is responsible for abandoned workings and who will pay for their rehabilitation.
And it requires establishing whether enforcement operations are weakening the criminal organisations behind illegal mining or simply removing the workers those organisations can replace.
South Africa’s illegal mining crisis is therefore no longer only a story about men disappearing underground in search of gold or platinum.
It is a story about what happens when abandoned industrial infrastructure, unemployment, valuable minerals and organised crime intersect.
The men underground remain the most visible part of that story.
But the deeper investigation begins when they come back to the surface.