08/06/2026
DA demands decisive action against illegal mining in Limpopo
by Jacques Smalle MPL - DA Provincial Spokesperson for Limpopo Economic Development, the Environment and Tourism
Date: 08 June 2026
Release: Immediate
-DA demands urgent action to catch the criminals driving illegal mining in Limpopo.
-Syndicates, buyers, financiers and complicit officials must be convicted, not protected.
-Government must clean up by restoring law and order and rehabilitating damaged land, roads and communities.
The Democratic Alliance (DA) in Limpopo reaffirms its ongoing call for immediate and coordinated government intervention to confront the escalating illegal mining crisis engulfing farming and rural communities across the province. Our message is simple: Catch the criminals. Convict the syndicates. Clean up: restore law and order, and rehabilitate the environment.
The DA demands coordinated, multi-disciplinary enforcement operations to catch those responsible, prosecution of syndicates, buyers, financiers and complicit officials, and rehabilitation of damaged land, rivers, roads and community infrastructure.
Premier Phophi Ramathuba, her Provincial Executive, the ANC-led Limpopo Legislature, and the provincial administration particularly the Limpopo Department of Economic Development, Environment, and Tourism (LEDET) have failed to act despite sustained and repeated calls by the DA to protect rural and farming communities, agriculture, water resources, and the environment from the growing threat posed by illegal mining.
Illegal mining in Limpopo has evolved into organised criminal activity operating with crass impunity across the province. The province now faces widespread illegal sand mining, zama-zama style gold mining operations, unlawful industrial-scale chrome extraction, and illegal coal mining. These activities are frequently conducted using heavy machinery, often in full view of authorities and with little fear of consequence.
In Atok Village in the Fetakgomo–Tubatse Local Municipality, rampant illegal chrome mining has devastated parts of the village and surrounding community. Excavators, loaders, and trucks reportedly operate openly within and near residential areas, while ground subsides, roads collapse, and homes stand dangerously close to or on top of excavation sites.
A geologist on an investigative episode of eNCA’s Checkpoint indicated that parts of the community may need to be relocated due to compromised ground integrity to allow for rehabilitation.
In the same programme, the Head of the Hawks in Limpopo, Major General Gopz Govender, stated that politicians and business people are complicit in the illicit mining industry in Limpopo and that these enterprises must be dismantled from top to bottom.
In the Steelpoort area, industrial-scale excavators are openly operating between Lion Smelter and the Tubatse Ferrochrome Plant.
In the Bergnek and Eerstegoud area between Mokopane and Polokwane, farming communities live amongst ongoing unlawful mining activity, infrastructure damage, fence cutting, land invasions, veld fires and intimidation – and the South African Police Service appears unable or uninterested in curbing it.
Limpopo cannot be permitted to drift further into a de facto lawless mining corridor.
Our farming and rural communities deserve protection, not abandonment.
Catch the criminals. Convict the syndicates. Clean up – restore law order, and rehabilitate the environment.
Media Enquiries
Jacques Smalle MPL
DA Provincial Spokesperson for Limpopo Economic Development, the Environment and Tourism
083 392 3334
Rodger Ferguson
Researcher
084 999 1356
