This statement comes in the wake of the tragic deaths of 78 illegal miners at a disused mine in Stilfontein, North West. Since November last year, over 1 500 illegal miners have surfaced from a shaft at the same mine, following a government-led operation that has now concluded.

David van Wyk, a representative of the Bench Marks Foundation, highlighted the central issue, "The high levels of unemployment in South Africa are central to the problem of why people risk their lives going underground in very dangerous situations to mine for gold and other minerals to sell on the surface. The Bench Marks Foundation, together with the Legal Resource Centre and the National Association of Artisanal Mining, worked for three to four years in making inputs to the national policy on artisanal mining, and we had hoped that policy would be released by now and implemented."

--SABC/ChannelAfrica--