Sixteen illegal miners found 100 metres underground
They have been arrested by the Magaliesburg police.
Yesterday afternoon (14 October) 16 alleged illegal miners were arrested inside an old mine shaft, while digging for gold.
Constable Rebecca Phithi, Magaliesburg police’s spokesperson, told the News the mine is not operational and it was indeed an old gold mine.
“We were contacted by the security company who was on scene and we made the arrest,” she said.
Richard van der Walt, the operations manager from MSR Security, said he has reaction officers who regularly patrol the mining area.
“The mine’s manager asked Christo van der Berg, one of the reaction officers, to accompany him underground where he suspected there to be illegal miners,” Richard said.
When the two men went under, they heard voices and chopping sounds further underground. They managed to apprehend three men and brought them to the surface. After going down a second time, they came across 13 more men.
“We found mine equipment like pans and chisels along with bags of gold,” he added.
According to Richard, previous arrests have been made at this mine before, but never as big a number as yesterday. He says they regularly see men going underground, but find it difficult to find and apprehend them.
These workers, risking their lives in the unsafe old mine tunnels, sometimes go under for up to five day at a time.
“The men we apprehended, were already going on three days,” Richard said.
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