![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.com\/zimbabwe\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/14\/2019\/02\/Kadoma-mine-disaster-relatives1-300x200.jpg\")
![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.com\/zimbabwe\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/14\/2019\/02\/draining-water-300x200.jpg\")
<\/p>\nRonald Dzumbunu\u2019s face reflects a picture of concern and torment as the sputtering sound of a generator powering the water pump being used to flush water out of a mine shaft to rescue four trapped miners could be heard kilometres away.<\/p>\n
Dzumbunu\u2019s distress has been felt in the rural setting of Muzvezve, about 180km from the capital, Harare, where a mine shaft was flooded by water after torrential rains burst the makeshift soil walls.<\/p>\n
Scores of artisanal miners were trapped and many died. Of the trapped, 24 bodies have been recovered while eight people were rescued in one of the biggest disasters to befall the country.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
Dzumbunu, with a measured voice and as he gawps into the blank space as if deep in thought, said: \u201cI know two people from the four who are still trapped underground.<\/p>\n
\u201cI sometimes feel like they are calling for help and urging us not to give up on them.<\/p>\n
\u201cThose are the people we grew up with. I am saying that they are still to be rescued, deliberately, because I believe God is with them and they will come out alive.\u201d<\/p>\n
But even as Dzumbunu is hopeful that the four might come out alive, he lapses at intervals and uses the past tense: \u201cThese were family men. They were breadwinners and it saddens us that this happened.\u201d<\/p>\n
This has been day five and relatives of the affected have kept vigil at the disused Cricket mine.<\/p>\n
Silent prayers, fighting tears and agonising occasional pump breakdowns defined the wait and the sombre mood.<\/p>\n
For some, it was just a wait for the normalisation of mining activities.<\/p>\n
\u201cThis is where the food comes from. This is my job and our livelihood,\u201d said an artisanal miner called Mike who was smoking marijuana with a host of others who vowed that as soon as the rescue mission is called off, they want to go back underground in search of the stone that glitters \u2014 gold.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe do not know any other way and while this is sad, this mine is what our lives are all about,\u201d one of them said.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe are waiting to continue digging.\u201d<\/p>\n
Mike added that as an artisanal miner, he had experienced horrible accidents underground, but the Battlefields disaster was the worst.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe go underground, knowing that anything can happen to us at any given time, and that is alright with us,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
\u201cPeople die for various reasons and the major one being a collapse of the shaft.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe experience that as we do our work but that is our employment that is what keeps my family alive.\u201d<\/p>\n
However, there is nothing that reflects that gold glitters in this rural community.<\/p>\n
Workers using earth moving equipment were busy patching the gravel road that branches from the Harare \u2013 Bulawayo highway to the mines.<\/p>\n
The stretch is about 7km to Silver Moon and Cricket mines.<\/p>\n
Mining conglomerate RioZim holds the licence to mine, but, according to the company\u2019s group corparate affairs executive Wilson Gwatiringa, they have no operations in the area.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt is almost a misnomer to have these earth-movers here as if we finally have the gold to rescue us from the poverty that gnashes us.<\/p>\n
\u201cPeople died and this is just not a number to flaunt and a time for politically correct actions.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe are saying these were breadwinners and we can do without the hypocrisy of government people ordering a road to be sorted.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe deserve better,\u201d said Takura Mutambo, who was among the gold panners waiting for the rescue mission by the Civil Protection Unit and other mining companies called in for technical support.<\/p>\n
Mutambo added: \u201cWe are unemployed. We have never had support. You need to be politically connected to get an opportunity.<\/p>\n
\u201cFor example these mines were a reward to the youths and without being part of the group you could not go underground. It is dangerous to be panning, but what options do we have?\u201d<\/p>\n
Many drop out of school to pursue what is regarded as easy money.<\/p>\n
A vendor who referred to herself as Gogo Mutema said most children were dropping out of school to fend for their families.<\/p>\n
\u201cSchools are far away from where we live. Children here grew up working in farms around or the only other life they got exposed to is this way of life.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe problem is that even when they get the money, the only way they celebrate is by drinking and having sex and this has been a cycle. The gold is both a curse and a blessing,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n
Besides deaths from working without the required safety protocols for mining given the illegality of gold panners, there is also a high number that have been murdered in the mining fields around the Zimbabwe.<\/p>\n
In Kwekwe, which is about 40km from Muzvezve, residents of the city have been living with the reality of the machete wars among gangs that attack each other over gold.<\/p>\n
This is a town that is supposed to show wealth and status owing to its strategic positioning above goldfields, but it has instead become a place of blood, conflict and pain.<\/p>\n
\u201cThis is my fear,\u201d Dzumbunu said.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe prefer it here because we managed to talk to each other and protect what we have.<\/p>\n
\u201cThis is a no machete zone. At some point in the past the Mashurugwi (colloquial for gold panners from Shurugwi notorious for using the machete to settle scores) came here with their machete behaviour and we stopped it.\u201d<\/p>\n
Last month Mbizo legislator, Settlement Chikwinya (MDC Alliance) vowed to confront head-on youths moving around attacking residents with machetes over politics and mineral resources in and around Kwekwe, but enjoying impunity because of their alleged links to Zanu PF.<\/p>\n
Speaking to Southern Eye, Chikwinya vowed to end the lawlessness, saying: \u201cMbizo now deserves peace\u201d.<\/p>\n
He added then: \u201cWe can\u2019t be counting bodies every month and injuries every day from people we are aware of.<\/p>\n
\u201cMbizo has recorded a death rate of close to three people per month in the past six months due to machete violence.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe machete-wielding youths are largely gold-panners who enjoy impunity provided by the Zanu PF leadership in Kwekwe and so this is what I want to fight against.\u201d<\/p>\n
In an interview with one victim last year, the man who had machete injuries and feared for his life told The Standard that being a gold panner was more dangerous than being in a war situation.<\/p>\n
As the pump roared and relatives shed tears by each gallon of water that came out, Muzvezve constituency was in a reflective mood, wondering if an ounce of gold was worth the struggle.<\/p>\n
\u201cDo they shut down the mine? Do we stop? The human instinct is that we have to survive and we will do all we can for that plate of sadza because our lives depend on it. We are all ready to go underground and earn a living,\u201d Dzumbunu said before digging into a plate of sadza and sour milk.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Ronald Dzumbunu\u2019s face reflects a picture of concern and torment as the sputtering sound of a generator powering the water pump being used to flush water out of a mine shaft to rescue four trapped miners could be heard kilometres away. Dzumbunu\u2019s distress has been felt in the rural setting of Muzvezve, about 180km from […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":84,"featured_media":4461,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3,4,35],"tags":[197,182,322,75],"class_list":{"0":"post-4456","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-all-news","8":"category-community","9":"category-homepage-english","10":"tag-mine-workers","11":"tag-miners","12":"tag-photos","13":"tag-zimbawe-policies"},"yoast_head":"\n