Gold Pirates
Gold pirates caught in police net
By Alex Eliseev
Kilometres below the ground, in pitch-black mineshafts, police are waging - and winning - an unusual war against armed gangs of pirate gold miners.
In six operations in Gauteng and the Free State over the past six months, specially trained police officers have arrested 60 of the rogue gold-diggers.
The pirates have been known to spend a year underground without surfacing; "hijacking" closed-off sections of legitimate mines; plundering them; and providing syndicates with tons of gold to smuggle abroad.
Three major international syndicates buying the illegal gold from South Africa have been identified, and the Institute for Security Studies estimates the pirates steal gold-rich ore worth around R2-billion every year.
To defend themselves against the police, the illegal miners booby-trap shafts with dynamite and do not hesitate to chuck home-made grenades at anyone who detects them.
Living in silent darkness, the men rely on smuggled loaves of bread and "grocery" bags snuck in to them by legitimate miners.
For months at a time they sleep on wooden planks and defy extreme heat, humidity and toxic mercury fumes.
Police say the syndicates consist of a range of people, including out-of-work mineworkers.
Unable to drive out the dangerous intruders, security companies at the mines turned to the police.
Faced with an unusual foe, more than 20 officers from the police's elite Special Task Force and the intervention and explosives units embarked on extraordinary training to flush out their suspects.
Before making their move, the officers practised several kilometres below the surface.
Practice rounds were held at a mine in Randfontein, Gauteng, and the first operations against the criminals took place at a Harmony mine near Welkom in the Free State, explained the police's Assistant Commissioner Mike Fryer.
Operations have also been conducted against the pirates in Johannesburg's City Deep area.
In one raid, at the end of August, 18 pirates were arrested and 23 of their homemade bombs confiscated. In the same operation, almost 400kg of gold-bearing material was seized.
It is believed the pirates smuggle gold-rich ore out of the mines and are also able to extract the gold themselves.
Describing the police operation - called Zama Zama, after the nickname given to the thieves by miners - Fryer said: "It's very dangerous. We bought the officers some new equipment because they can't use guns down there as bullets could spark gas explosions."
Police declined to divulge the nature of the equipment they used to arrest the pirates, fearing it could jeopardise future operations.
Fryer said police had received further information about pirates at work in more of Gauteng's mines, and future operations - and arrests - would follow.
"This is organised crime. The gold is going upstairs and the question is: What is the money being used for?" Fryer said.
While underground, the pirates' preferred choice of food and drink is loaves of bread and 2-litre Coke bottles, because of its high energy content. These are snuck in by legitimate miners and sold for as much as R40 each.
A bag of "groceries", which includes items like peanuts and Cremora coffee creamer - rich in protein - can sell for up to R2 000. For beds, the pirates use planks of wood. They have to contend with temperatures of over 30°C, high humidity and deadly mercury fumes.
"They have no radios because sound travels underground and they need to be as quiet as possible, so as not to be detected. They sleep, stand up and work. There's nothing else for them to do," said police explosives expert Superintendent Joe Meiring.
The pirates are also believed to have women living with them in their lairs and can receive post.
Meiring said the pirates mainly used commercial explosives to work and had three methods to defend themselves:
Selecting an area and "rigging it" with explosives, creating a deadly booby-trap;
Throwing homemade hand-grenades at authorities or legitimate mineworkers approaching them. Fryer explained that before police intervened, a pirate had thrown a grenade at a group of workers. Luckily the group were in a safe location and "took the shock without any injuries or rockfalls". "They are prepared to use them (grenades), for sure," he said.
They use the "command wire" method, which is commonly used in the Iraq war, where a bomb is concealed and detonated from a distance of about 100m if "visitors" don't know the "secret code".
So far police officers had managed to ambush the pirates, Fryer said, and no officers have been hurt or killed.
In one case, a pirate died underground and his body was left near a lift being used by legitimate workers. After the miners made the discovery, they brought the body to the surface.
Asked how his officers have responded to their underground crime-fighting duties, Fryer said: "It's lekker, they love it. It's something new."
National Police Commissioner Jackie Selebi congratulated his officers on the arrests.
"We are ready to go into the belly of the earth," he said.
All 60 miners arrested have appeared in court and have been charged for breaking mining regulations and for being in possession of explosives illegally.
By Alex Eliseev
Kilometres below the ground, in pitch-black mineshafts, police are waging - and winning - an unusual war against armed gangs of pirate gold miners.
In six operations in Gauteng and the Free State over the past six months, specially trained police officers have arrested 60 of the rogue gold-diggers.
The pirates have been known to spend a year underground without surfacing; "hijacking" closed-off sections of legitimate mines; plundering them; and providing syndicates with tons of gold to smuggle abroad.
| 'They can't use guns down there as bullets could spark gas explosions' |
To defend themselves against the police, the illegal miners booby-trap shafts with dynamite and do not hesitate to chuck home-made grenades at anyone who detects them.
Living in silent darkness, the men rely on smuggled loaves of bread and "grocery" bags snuck in to them by legitimate miners.
For months at a time they sleep on wooden planks and defy extreme heat, humidity and toxic mercury fumes.
Police say the syndicates consist of a range of people, including out-of-work mineworkers.
| 'The gold is going upstairs' |
Faced with an unusual foe, more than 20 officers from the police's elite Special Task Force and the intervention and explosives units embarked on extraordinary training to flush out their suspects.
Before making their move, the officers practised several kilometres below the surface.
Practice rounds were held at a mine in Randfontein, Gauteng, and the first operations against the criminals took place at a Harmony mine near Welkom in the Free State, explained the police's Assistant Commissioner Mike Fryer.
Operations have also been conducted against the pirates in Johannesburg's City Deep area.
In one raid, at the end of August, 18 pirates were arrested and 23 of their homemade bombs confiscated. In the same operation, almost 400kg of gold-bearing material was seized.
It is believed the pirates smuggle gold-rich ore out of the mines and are also able to extract the gold themselves.
Describing the police operation - called Zama Zama, after the nickname given to the thieves by miners - Fryer said: "It's very dangerous. We bought the officers some new equipment because they can't use guns down there as bullets could spark gas explosions."
Police declined to divulge the nature of the equipment they used to arrest the pirates, fearing it could jeopardise future operations.
Fryer said police had received further information about pirates at work in more of Gauteng's mines, and future operations - and arrests - would follow.
"This is organised crime. The gold is going upstairs and the question is: What is the money being used for?" Fryer said.
While underground, the pirates' preferred choice of food and drink is loaves of bread and 2-litre Coke bottles, because of its high energy content. These are snuck in by legitimate miners and sold for as much as R40 each.
A bag of "groceries", which includes items like peanuts and Cremora coffee creamer - rich in protein - can sell for up to R2 000. For beds, the pirates use planks of wood. They have to contend with temperatures of over 30°C, high humidity and deadly mercury fumes.
"They have no radios because sound travels underground and they need to be as quiet as possible, so as not to be detected. They sleep, stand up and work. There's nothing else for them to do," said police explosives expert Superintendent Joe Meiring.
The pirates are also believed to have women living with them in their lairs and can receive post.
Meiring said the pirates mainly used commercial explosives to work and had three methods to defend themselves:
So far police officers had managed to ambush the pirates, Fryer said, and no officers have been hurt or killed.
In one case, a pirate died underground and his body was left near a lift being used by legitimate workers. After the miners made the discovery, they brought the body to the surface.
Asked how his officers have responded to their underground crime-fighting duties, Fryer said: "It's lekker, they love it. It's something new."
National Police Commissioner Jackie Selebi congratulated his officers on the arrests.
"We are ready to go into the belly of the earth," he said.
All 60 miners arrested have appeared in court and have been charged for breaking mining regulations and for being in possession of explosives illegally.
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