Brendan Ryan reports that an invasion of more than one thousand illegal diamond miners – zama-zamas – in Kimberley in the Northern Cape is threatening the viability of London-listed Petra Diamonds (Petra) operations.
If left unchecked, this could also have serious negative consequences for SA’s overall diamond mining and beneficiation industries. The reason is that the diamonds recovered by the zama-zamas are in contravention of the Kimberley Process certification scheme, which is meant to assure consumers that diamonds have been legally mined and are not “conflict diamonds”. Instead, the diamonds mined by the zama-zamas are being sold through IDB (illicit diamond buying) channels with the revenues flowing to unknown criminal organisations. According to Petra CEO Johan Dippenaar it would be extremely bad for the country if people started to view SA diamonds as being tainted. This report goes on to point out other very deleterious effects of the illegal mining operations.
- Read this report in full at Miningmx
- Read too, Illegal mining remains a 'serious' challenge: Chamber of Mines, at Mining Weekly
- And also, Syndicates are biggest task in fight against illegal mining: Zwane, at Miningmx
Get other news reports at the SA Labour News home page