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Sukulwenkosi Dube-Matutu, Gwanda Correspondent
There is a gold rush in Zamanyoni Village, Ward 19 in Matobo district, a development which poses a health threat during the prevailing Covid-19 pandemic.
More than 400 people from various wards in the district have converged at the panning site to mine or sell food and other wares. Youngsters who are of school going age are also part of the people who have rushed to the area to raise income.
They are being used as labourers to transport gold ore from a mountain where the mining is taking place while others are selling wares that include beverages, cigarettes and clothes among other things.
In a report Ministry of Information, Publicity and Broadcasting Services Matabeleland South Provincial Information Officer, Mr Austin Nyathi who is also the chairperson of provincial information and risk communications subcommittee said the committee visited the area on Wednesday where they noted that people were violating Covid-19 regulations.
“Information and risk communications subcommittee members visited an area under Zamanyoni Village where gold deposits were recently discovered. The gold deposits were discovered on the top of Zamanyoni Mountain which in the past was believed to be sacred. This has resulted in people from all the wards in Matobo flocking to the area either seeking the precious mineral or to sell food and other wares.
“When the subcommittee arrived at the site it noted that there were no hand washing facilities, physical distancing was not being observed and some people had no face masks. The thrust of the visit was to raise awareness on the Covid-19 disease and about 300 people were conscientised excluding those that were working on top of the mountain who were said to be more than a 100,” he said.
Mr Nyathi said the investigations they carried out also revealed that following the closure of schools due to the Covid-19 pandemic, pupils aged 12 and 17 were being contracted to ferry gold ore for 10 rand per bag.
He said the youngsters were being paid according to the number of bags they would have carried from the top of the mountain where the ore is being extracted to the bottom of the mountain where it is loaded and transported to a milling plant.
“Members of the police liaison department together with social welfare have urged these miners to desist from exploiting child labour. However, due to the drought-induced hunger prevalent in the district, these under-aged children still continue to go to Zamanyoni Mountain searching for the precious mineral.
“Young girls also sell wares at the site and this has seen some falling prey to these artisanal miners and becoming pregnant. Most of the families in Matobo District survived on remittances from neighbouring countries such as South Africa and Botswana but due to the Covid-19 economic disruptions, some are no longer receiving these remittances,” he said.
In an interview Matobo District Development Co-ordinator who is also the chairperson of the district taskforce committee on Covid-19, Mr Obey Chaputsira said people started flocking to the panning site about two months ago. He said the district taskforce committee on Covid-19 had conducted several visits to the panning site to conscientise people on the need to comply with Covid-19 regulations.
Mr Chaputsira said the site was rich in gold deposits which was attracting many villagers. — @DubeMatutu.
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