KWEKWE – As many as 20 illegal miners are feared trapped or dead after a shaft collapsed at Gold and Phoenix Mine in Kwekwe on Wednesday night, officials said.
If confirmed, it would be the second major mining disaster within a year. This month last year, 28 illegal miners died at Crickets Mine in Kadoma after their tunnels flooded.
Two bodies were retrieved on Thursday, hours after a large boulder careered down the narrow shaft, sealing off the tunnel, and it is feared killing all the men underground.
Fortune Mupungu, the Kwekwe District Civil Protection Unit chairman, said they had sent a rescue team for an initial assessment underground, leading to the discovery of the two dead bodies which were brought to the surface.
“The rescue operation has been going on and we are yet to identify any more miners. These are illegal miners who operate at night, so we cannot ascertain how many they were,” Mupungu told Reuters.
Mupungu said no mining activity should have been taking place at Gold and Phoenix Mine after the Environmental Management Agency (EMA) ordered it closed in 2017 due to safety concerns.
The latest accident highlights the risks run by illegal gold miners in Zimbabwe.
Kwekwe and the areas are rich in gold deposits and popular with artisanal miners, known locally as “Makorokoza” or hustlers, who work in unsafe shafts using picks and shovels and generator-powered water pumps.
In the past month police have arrested hundreds of illegal miners involved in violent turf wars for mining claims.
