The South African National Defence Force's deployment to combat crime and illegal mining operations will cost taxpayers more than R800 million, according to News24 reports, raising questions about whether military solutions can address what many economists call fundamentally economic problems.
The deployment focuses on dismantling illegal mining networks, known locally as "zama zamas," which have proliferated across South Africa's abandoned and active mine shafts. These operations, often involving migrant workers from neighboring countries, have become increasingly organized and violent.
"We're spending nearly a billion rand to address a symptom, not the cause," says Dr. Thabo Makgoba, an economist at the University of Johannesburg. "Illegal mining exists because formal employment doesn't. Until we fix that, military deployments are just expensive band-aids."
The cost breaks down to deployment logistics, personnel, equipment, and ongoing operational expenses. Yet similar military deployments across the continent, from Nigeria's Operation Crocodile Smile to Zimbabwe's interventions in Chiadzwa diamond fields, have shown mixed results at best.
In Ghana, Operation Halt in 2017 successfully disrupted illegal gold mining operations, but activity resumed within months once troops withdrew. Tanzania's military crackdown on illegal mining in 2017-2018 initially showed promise but ultimately failed to address the underlying poverty driving people into dangerous, unregulated work.
What makes South Africa's approach particularly contentious is the cost versus the scale of formal employment the same funds could create. R800 million could fund approximately 16,000 public sector jobs at minimum wage for a year, or support thousands of small mining cooperatives that could formalize illegal operations.
"The military can clear mine shafts today," says , a community organizer in where illegal mining is rampant.
