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Golden opportunity in South Africa

mining collage

Black miners seek unused mineral rights held by white firms

July 21, 1997
Web posted at: 4:29 p.m. EDT (2029 GMT)

MPUMALANGA PROVINCE, South Africa (CNN) -- Joe Mhlanga hopes to strike it rich in the mountains where he and generations of black South Africans before him have burrowed into the earth in search of gold.

White-owned corporations still control most mines here. And strictly speaking, the work Mhlanga and fellow diggers are doing in Mpumalanga Province is illegal.

S. African gold mining
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But unlike the past, negotiations are under way to make black ownership possible. In areas where corporate miners have stopped looking for gold, the black majority government elected in 1994 now supports miners in their fight to claim mineral rights.

"There are a lot of mines around here and they are not using these mines," Mhlanga told CNN. "So I don't know why it's so difficult for them to give us these rights."

Ironically, a falling gold price strengthens the miners' position, emphasizing their argument that they can make a profit where the big companies no longer try.

"Sometimes you dig for about two or three months without getting anything," Mhlanga said. "Sometimes you dig for one day you get kilos (kilograms). It depends how rich the (mine) is." One kilogram equals 2.2 pounds.

Bribing whites to sell gold dust

An older miner named Mkete remembers when the squatters did their digging in secrecy. "We had to work at night and we had to bribe whites to sell our gold dust."

"I don't know how old I am now," he adds, "but I was tending the cattle as a youngster during Hitler's war."

And indeed mining methods in these mountains have not changed at all since Mkete was young.

The gold-bearing ore is still dug out of the rock face and crushed by hand.

If it's of a high enough quality, it is carried down the mountain to a hand-cranked separator similar to those used at the turn of the century.

Nevertheless, Mhlanga believes he can still achieve his dream. He says there are hundreds of others like him, but they fear mining openly, as he does. "They know they will be arrested if they come out and say a word."

Instead, Mhlanga expects the others to continue to operate in secret until the mineral rights no longer being exercised by the white owners are transferred legally to those who want to mine.

Johannesburg Bureau Chief Mike Hanna contributed to this report.  
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