Stilfontein mine tragedy was a consequence of SA’s porous borders, says police minister

Police Minister Senzo Mchunu told Parliament on Tuesday that the Stilfontein mine tragedy, in which 93 illegal miners died and nearly 2,000 were arrested, was a consequence of South Africa’s insecure borders.

Calling illegal immigration a “huge problem”, the minister said: “The overall fundamental issue is border management”. He was addressing a joint meeting of Parliament’s portfolio committees on minerals and petroleum resources, and police.

Police top brass and officials from the Department of Mineral and Petroleum Resources briefed the committees on illegal mining and derelict and ownerless mines, respectively.

The acting North West police commissioner, Major General Patrick Asaneng, said a total of 944 police officers took part in the operation at Stilfontein from August 2024 up till March 2025 at a cost of R23-million for deployments and R9.8-million for overtime payments.

Read more: Stilfontein mine rescue ends with 78 dead, 246 rescued and ringleaders in custody 

Asaneng said the majority of the illegal miners were undocumented migrants.

“In the main, the people that came to the surface were Mozambicans, who accounted for 1,128; Zimbabweans, 473; South Africans, 26; Basotho, 197; and one Congolese and one Malawian,” he said — a total of 1,826.

“All these suspects were charged with, among others, illegal mining which is a criminal offence. In South Africa, for anybody to conduct mining you need a licence or a permit.

“They must be permitted and these people were not permitted to be operating there, hence the police were leading the operation. They were also charged by Home Affairs for being in the country illegally, including for possession of gold-bearing material and unlawful possession of explosives that they used underground.”

Asaneng told the committees that a “total of 93 corpses were retrieved”.

He said that 640kg of gold-bearing material worth about R46-million and 6.2kg of refined gold worth R6-million was confiscated in addition to nearly half a million rands in cash.

“This cash that they found, they [miners] were even operating shops, businesses underground.”

He said 242 dockets had been opened. “All these dockets have since appeared before court” and 35 had been finalised, he said.

‘Not natural deaths’

Police employed a “surrender or starve” strategy to force miners to surface in Stilfontein that aimed to “smoke them out”, according to Minister in the Presidency Khumbudzo Ntshavheni.

Daily Maverick reported last month that according to the Mining Affected Communities United in Action (Macua), at least 20 of the miners died of starvation and dehydration. The organisation appointed an independent pathologist to carry out autopsies on the dead miners.

“These are not natural deaths — they were entirely preventable. The government deliberately refused to intervene, knowingly allowing these men to die in slow agony. This was not simply a case of miners entering a dangerous situation; the greatest and most lethal danger came from the state itself,” said Sabelo Mnguni, Macua’s national administrator.

Read more: Stilfontein massacre a stark reminder of South Africa’s ongoing struggle with human rights violations

While the mine rescue operation has ended, the shaft is still being guarded by the police because of other crimes in the area.

At the briefing on Tuesday, Mchunu sought to underscore the points made by the SAPS top brass, saying, “I would imagine that among issues that we have to deal with is border management.”

Referring to the illegal miners who had entered South Africa without documentation, he emphasised, “That alone is a huge problem and a huge challenge. It could have gone to mining and then we learn through illegal mining that there is this problem but it could have gone elsewhere, in another sector, and reflected these same numbers.

“Because it is clear it is not just a reflection of what’s happening in illegal mining, it’s in the other sectors as well. It could be there like this and it could be worse. The overall fundamental issue is border management.”

He urged the departments and Parliament to throw their weight behind security cluster efforts to address this “fundamental issue”, saying, “This is what will be the consequence if we continue with borders that are leaking.” DM