Debt bondage, forced labour at illegal mines in Ekurhuleni - TimesLIVE

When Thabo* left Lesotho last year, he thought he was going to a good job in South Africa. After all, an old school friend working in Rustenburg had recruited him, promising decent pay.

He was sent R1,000 and picked up in a fancy car from his home at Motete in the Butha-Buthe district. Little did he know there was a much higher price to pay.

“The man who drove us was so nice; he even stopped at the mall and bought us clothes and food,” Thabo recalled. “It felt like a dream — until we woke to a nightmare.”

The driver had taken Thabo to Mandleni informal settlement, a notorious base for illegal mining on the East Rand, where he was handed over to a miner whom he knows only as Victor.

His passport was immediately taken for “safekeeping”, and he was told he owed R6,000 for his journey, his work clothes, accommodation and the equipment he would use as a miner.

Months later, in August, he was still working long shifts underground, breaking rocks for Victor and his other handlers.

I asked if I could go home. My team leader told me I had to first pay off my debts. He beat me a month ago after my shift and did not pay me for three weeks

He agreed to be interviewed in the dirt-floored shack where he sleeps on the floor with four other miners.

A few weeks after his arrival, Thabo realised he was trapped in a cycle of debt bondage and forced labour. He tried to escape but was caught and raped by a crew of zama zamas, under Victor’s orders.

A year later, he is still in Mandleni, living in constant fear.

“I asked if I could go home. My team leader told me I had to first pay off my debts,” Thabo said. “He beat me a month ago after my shift and did not pay me for three weeks.”

Mandleni is located on Heidelberg Road near Wattville township south of Benoni. The residents have grown to accept the illegal miners, but many don’t know the extent to which young men and women are trapped in various forms of “debt bondage”.

This is when someone is forced to work to repay a “debt” which is structured so they cannot ever realistically settle it. It is the most common form of forced labour around the world, according to the International Labour Organisation.

Thabo’s is not an isolated case. The Southern Africa Accountability Journalism Project (SA | AJP) spoke to several young people who reported being trapped in a cycle of debt and backbreaking work. This report highlights three of those conversations.

Illegal minders emerge from an old mine shaft at Wattville Dam, across the road from the Mandleni informal settlement on the East Rand, on August 28 2026. Picture: Tebogo Letsie/SA|AJP (Tebogo Letsie) Joaquim* said he was lured by promises of work and decent pay from his home village of Inhambane on Mozambique’s southern coast.

He was just 17 when he travelled to Johannesburg two years ago, believing he would work as a bricklayer for a contractor. At the time, he was the only breadwinner among his siblings, who had been orphaned when their parents died in a boat accident while travelling to sell fish to tourists.

“We had to fend for ourselves,” Joaquim said in an interview in Mandleni.

A friend referred him to what he believed to be a construction recruiter, but it was a trap.

“I called the number, and the recruiter sent me instant money via the M-Pesa app,” Joaquim said. “I left Maputo after the recruiter, based in South Africa, sent me bus fare.”

At the Mozambican border he was received by a man who helped him cross into South Africa. “We drove about seven hours with two others whom we met in Komatipoort.“

When he got to Mandleni, there was no construction job and no contract. He became a zama zama working underground, inhaling dust and praying every day he’d make it back to the surface.

“I asked to leave once, and my leader got angry and told me I couldn’t go until my debt was paid. I have not tried to escape because I heard what happens to guys who try,” he said. “Here, if you co-operate, you have few problems. If you don’t, you get punished. I will eventually leave, but for now I’m scared.”

The debt is not simply a recruitment cost; it is a mechanism for keeping workers trapped.

By paying for their transport and housing, the scammers “bond” the migrants to the illegal operation and its owners. Protection fees, fuel fees and food are used to control the workers

“The debt does not end because we are also charged protection fees, generator fees and fuel fees,” said Joaquim. “Fuel is gold because we use it to generate electricity and light underground and for the machinery and drills, so we pay R250 weekly. If you don’t pay, it’s written down, and the debt accumulates.”

During our two-month investigation it became clear the modus operandi was designed to trap young adults and teenagers from Lesotho, Mozambique and Zimbabwe in illegal mining operations in Mandleni. By paying for their transport and housing, the scammers “bond” the migrants to the illegal operation and its owners.

Protection fees, fuel fees and food are used to control the workers.

Mpho*, 22, left Lesotho for Johannesburg after a woman in her church WhatsApp group said there were cooking and cleaning jobs for miners in Carletonville. Transport was paid. Accommodation was to be included.

But Mpho ended up in Mandleni. There were no formal jobs, and the settlement was controlled by a network of men who ran the illegal shafts. The woman who recruited her handed her over and disappeared.

“I was sexually abused by the team leader the first month. He came into my shack every day and told me I was his wife. At first I consented, but one day I refused because I was on my period, and he got angry and sent four men to forcefully sleep with me,” Mpho recalled, sobbing.

She said she was warned that if she left without paying off her debt she would be beaten or handed over to police because she had no documents.

She said the team leader told her the only way to settle the debt was to “entertain” miners.

During the interview, Mpho was rolling and smoking dagga and drinking a Black Label quart. She said this was to numb the pain. She regrets accepting the offer that turned her life upside down.

“Anyone who wants to sleep with me pays the boss. I get R450 a week,” she said, adding that the experience had left her feeling “betrayed, broken and worthless”.

She said she once asked a policeman for help, and he reported her to one of the kingpins.

Two men tend to 'phendukas' powered by generators at the Mandleni informal settlement. The 'phendukas' crush gold-bearing ore into fine material before it is washed and further processed using chemicals to extract gold. Picture: Tebogo Letsie/SA|AJP (Tebogo Letsie) Throughout this investigation, various interviewees alleged police were working with the illegal mining bosses.

These allegations were supported by a shaft guard who said he had been recruited by a Benoni police officer, whom he named. His job was to guard the entrance to a shaft at Watville Dam, monitoring who came and went and watching for rival gangs.

He alleged that police were part of the syndicate, providing transport and escorts to miners, while higher-ranking officers also benefited. He said police collected regular “tax” or protection fees from miners and regional buyers in return for allowing them to operate undisturbed.

This journalist observed police officers in both branded and unbranded vans entering Mandleni repeatedly over several weeks. They often stayed for 30 minutes to an hour or longer. The purpose of the visits could not be established, nor could the allegations of collusion be independently verified.

The SA | AJP submitted a query to Col Katlego Mogale, spokesperson for the Directorate for Priority Crime Investigation (DPCI, known as the Hawks), highlighting the allegations of forced labour and trafficking and the allegations against the police.

Mogale responded: “With regard to allegations of forced labour, human trafficking or exploitation of children, the DPCI is not in a position to confirm or refute such allegations in the absence of evidence establishing the relevant offences.

“At this stage, the DPCI does not have cases in which alleged victims have come forward and formally reported trafficking or labour exploitation.

“The DPCI further supports a multidisciplinary approach to illegal mining, recognising that effective intervention requires not only law-enforcement action but also co-ordinated measures addressing the socioeconomic vulnerabilities that contribute to the exploitation of people in illegal mining environments.”

* The names of interviewees have been changed.