In a conversation on another platform – The Poor are not to Blame for Galamsey: We must be careful about how far we take this argument – that galamsey is propelled by the needy and miserable.
I fully agree that where you do not improve livelihoods, where you have endemic misery; anti-social behaviour rises.
But by that logic why do we jail people at all ? Should we open our prisons and free all inmates?
There are chicken thieves, corn thieves, armed robbers, and more, who stole because they were hungry.
Should we build a jurisprudence that grants immunity for crime to all the poor and hungry?
And, the Galamsey kingpins who really make this trade happen are not hungry people. Two of those who have been fingered by the AG are political big wigs. They drive RRs, Bentleys, etc. They live large in mansions, and are very politically connected.
It is such people, not peasants, that have the capability to bring in the excavators, industrial chemicals and arms needed to sustain Galamsey.
Galamsey requires massive bribing of the police, courts, etc. The peasants do not do that.
So when we argue as though peasants discoloured the water bodies, we must be careful.
There was Galamsey (gather them and sell) before we were all born. But it never had such deleterious impacts, because it was artisanal – done with basic shovels and tools.
What we have now is industrial, it partially funds political parties, which is why politicians – on all sides – dither.
Galamsey is an ecocidal crime, generated and sustained by wilfully orchestrated political capture and state incompetence. We cannot fudge that festering reality by blaming poor peasants, in escapist flights of fancy.
There is a lot of gold in South Africa, and there are more poor people there. Why are their water bodies clear?
