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Residents fall to death in gold pits
Residents of Amonikakinei Village, Buteba Sub-county, Busia District, gather around pits left behind by artisanal gold miners, where a child is believed to have drowned. PHOTO/DAVID AWORI
What you need to know:
- To regulate the sector, the Ministry of Energy has embarked on consultation and sensitisation as they move to implement regulations aimed at managing small-scale and artisanal miners in the country.
- In the same village, Catherine Akello survived after soil slumped and covered her with other 18 women about a month ago.
Gold mining in Busia District is almost turning into a “curse” after reports that several have lost lives in some of the mines that have been abandoned in the villages of Agata and Tiira in Buteba and Sikuda Sub-counties respectively.
Reports suggest that the gold pits which have been left behind as a result of open cast mining leave several deaths in their wake annually, with some of the victims either being covered by soil or drowning in water-filled mines.
The latest victim to die in an abandoned mine in Agata Village is Alvin Kabagambe, 14.
His elder brother, Bob Sadiki, who was among the hundreds of people who gathered to search for Kabagambe’s body, said Kabagambe drowned after he tried to swim in one of the many abandoned gold mines in the village.
“We are told that he was trying to swim in this over 100-feet deep, water-filled abandoned mine,” Sadiki said on Monday.
Other reports, however, suggest that the deceased had escaped from their home in Solo ‘C’ village to temporarily engage in gold mining when he walked to the abandoned mine to swim.
According to Sadiki, children who saw him drown ran back home and notified an elderly woman who was staying with Kabagambe.
Residents in Agata village estimate that close to 20 people, among them young children, die in these pits annually.
Robert Odengero, a resident, said within a period of one year, he had lost two sons on separate occasions namely; Justin Okeba, 27, and Joel Ochoge, 25, after the open cast pits in which they were working reportedly curved in.
In Tiira village, Catherine Amoit was last year orphaned after soil curved in and claimed the life of her mother Judith Agwala.
Amoit, whose father died in 2014 while she was still in primary school, now has to look after her young siblings following the death of their mother who was the sole breadwinner.
According to Amoit, on that fateful day, her mother went to the mines, but before she could get any gold ore stones, soil curved in and buried her.
“Residents gathered and retrieved her from the collapsed mine, but it was too late to save her life,” she said.
In the same village, Catherine Akello survived after soil slumped and covered her with other 18 women about a month ago.
Akello suffered a broken backbone, and although she was referred to Mulago Hospital, she is stuck at her home without any treatment because they could not raise the medical bills.
In total, it is estimated that annually, close to 50 people die in gold mines left behind by artisanal miners in Buteba, Sikuda and Tiira.
Ali Eruto, a resident of Amonikakinei Village, says they have lost 8 residents in the abandoned pits since the beginning of this year, while Luka Ogwen, a resident of Agata Village, said since last year, they have lost 14 people.
Ogwen says the deaths could even be more because in some cases, the miners never report to the mineral police, but simply remove the bodies and secretly hand them over to their families for burial.
He added that some children have disappeared from the village without trace and are feared to have died in the mines.
Robert Odengero (in striped t-shirt) stands beside a grave of one of his sons. The resident of Agata Village, Buteba Sub-county in Busia District has reportedly lost two sons in abandoned mines within one year. PHOTO/DAVID AWORI
In Tiira, Joshua Omerikiti, a local leader, says each year, they lose “close to 20 people” to either the abandoned mines or after soils curved in on the miners.
“People keep dying in the mines; at least one person in every month and sometimes up to three people,” he said.
Omerikiti says opencast pits present a challenge to the miners who have to pump water out of the mines, after which such pits are usually abandoned.
The abandoned pits have significantly reduced the land available for crop and animal rearing, and instead become breeding areas for mosquitoes.
David Egesa, a resident of Agata Village, says the abandoned pits have reduced farmland and grazing areas for livestock, leaving most farmers with limited grazing places.
Busia District Environment Officer, Jimmy Ngolobe, described as “true” reports that many deaths had been recorded in the abandoned pits.
He added that the open cast method was responsible for exposure of infertile and hard pans of soils which are not conducive for crop cultivation and limit the growth of pastures for livestock grazing.
Govt intervenes
To regulate the sector, the Ministry of Energy has embarked on consultation and sensitisation as they move to implement regulations aimed at managing small-scale and artisanal miners in the country.
The Commissioner for Mines in the Ministry of Energy, Agnes Alaba, said they are beginning to register all artisanal miners in the country and thinks that it will weed out illegal activities in the mining sector.
She said they are aware of the many abandoned mines and are working with National Environment Management Authority (Nema) to ensure that miners restore the mined areas and in future, miners will have to undertake an Environment Impact Assessment (EIA) before being granted licenses.
