Migrant workers from Lesotho and Mozambique are trapped in brutal debt bondage and forced labour at illegal mines in Mandleni, facing violence and impossible debts for basic travel and survival costs, according to an investigation published on August 28, 2026.
False Promises and the Journey to Mandleni
The cycle typically begins across national borders with an offer of legitimate work. When Thabo left Lesotho, an old school friend working in Rustenburg had recruited him with promises of decent pay, sending R1,000 and picking him up in a fancy car from his home at Motete in the Butha-Buthe district. Similarly, Joaquim was just 17 when he left his home village of Inhambane on Mozambique’s southern coast two years ago, believing he would work as a bricklayer for a contractor after a friend referred him to a recruiter who sent bus fare via the M-Pesa app.
Those promises dissolved upon arrival in South Africa. Instead of construction or standard mining employment, the victims were delivered to the Mandleni informal settlement on Heidelberg Road near Wattville township, south of Benoni on the East Rand. Mandleni serves as a notorious base for illegal mining operations. Upon arrival, handlers immediately confiscated passports for safekeeping and saddled the workers with steep initial debts covering transport, work clothes, accommodation, and equipment.
Life Underground Under the Control of Zama Zamas
Months after arriving, the workers found themselves trapped underground for long shifts, breaking rocks for handlers and operating as illegal miners known as zama zamas while inhaling dust and facing constant physical danger. The debt structure is deliberately engineered to prevent escape. Handlers charge workers for the very tools and living conditions required to survive, transforming basic existence into a permanent financial trap.
The debt does not end because we are also charged protection fees, generator fees and fuel fees,
Joaquim said in an interview detailing how fuel costs R250 weekly to run the generators and drills needed for underground work. Unpaid fees are simply added to an accumulating ledger.
Violence, Fear, and Punishments for Defiance
Attempting to leave or question the arrangement brings immediate retaliation from team leaders and work crews. Workers live in crowded, dirt-floored shacks alongside several other miners while navigating an atmosphere of constant intimidation and physical violence.
I asked if I could go home. My team leader told me I had to first pay off my debts.
Thabo, interviewed in Mandleni
Another worker described the severe consequences of defiance within the camp. 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,
Joaquim 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.
For Thabo, an escape attempt ended in severe sexual assault by a crew of zama zamas acting under orders from a handler he knows as Victor.
Regional Scale of Modern Debt Bondage
The crisis in Mandleni reflects a much broader international pattern. According to the International Labour Organisation, debt bondage—where individuals are forced to work to repay a debt structured so they cannot realistically settle it—remains the most common form of forced labour worldwide.
The two-month investigation revealed a systematic modus operandi designed to ensnare young adults and teenagers from Lesotho, Mozambique, and Zimbabwe into illegal mining shafts. While local residents near the Wattville Dam and Mandleni have grown accustomed to the presence of illegal miners across the road, the deep entanglement of vulnerable cross-border migrants in forced labour and debt slavery largely remains hidden beneath the surface of the East Rand informal settlement.