The sack, rape, desecration and murder of #empire ...:

* The 1770 #Bengali famine, designed by the #EastIndiaCompany to destroy the local #cotton #fabric industry and invent a poisonous drug trade in its place.
* The looting and burning of the #OldSummerPalace near #Beijing, ordered by the same #Elgin who chopped up the #Parthenon.
* The destruction of the #Irish language through imperial policy, as dramatised in #BrianFriel 's #Translations (a magnificent and ambiguous play, describing linguistic polarisation, but not itself partisan).
* Labour #racism and engineered #alcoholism in #SouthAfrican #gold mines, from the 19th Century, with repercussions even until now - #ZamaZama mining is its modern evolution.

None of this is forgotten. Let it never be forgotten.

From the article:

"There is also a kind of phobic imagination of this nearly animal quality that is attributed to people who spend months underground. And of course, the story that came out this past week at the high court of people being forced into cannibalism, and before that eating insects. This does nothing to help them, but few commentators are addressing the degree to which there is armed coercion involved in this. The security organisations who operate the shaft to keep people underground are merciless. They enact forms of brutality that are pretty hard to get your head around.

Weirdly, in the illicit economy, the middle managers are entirely absent from the conversation. We never talk about them in poaching — we never talk about who actually puts the elephant tusk in a bag and takes it on a plane to Dubai. We never have that conversation. And we don’t talk about the guys at or near the top. How the sharp end of the informal mining sector is getting away, literally, with murder? Is it a problem with the press? Are we not doing a good enough job exposing how these systems function? Is it since they are part of our authority structures — cops and politicians?"

https://www.dailymaverick.co.za/article/2025-01-16-notes-on-the-underground-where-the-most-desperate-and-impoverished-scavenge-for-illicit-gold/

#ZamaZama

#southafrica 's government of national unity had to be sued to allow professionals to begin rescuing hundreds of impoverished miners from where police have entombed them two kilometers below ground for months at #Stilfontein

there are many things wrong with #zamazama mining. the deliberate killing of miners by the state quickly overtakes them. public statements and public silence from all ministers and parties are a shameful exposition of the quality of leadership at the top.

if watching volunteers from local communities rig pulleys and spliced rope together to haul miners out of that deep shaft BY HAND in December didn't prompt government to rethink a stupid plan —

https://groundup.org.za/article/several-bodies-and-over-50-emaciated-zama-zamas-recovered-from-the-mine-in-stilfontein-on-tuesday-afternoon/

Exploring South Africa's Illegal Mining Crisis in Stilfontein

Zama zamas expose poverty, desperation and regulatory failures in the country's abandoned mines.#southafrica #zamazama #stilfontein #mining #illegalmining
What's Happening in South Africa's Stilfontein Mines?