Mines Minister Hon. Dr. Polite Kambamura has laid bare a devastating safety crisis in Zimbabwe’s mining sector, revealing that 64 artisanal and small-scale miners died between January and March 2026 alone, a 6 percent jump from the same period last year.
In a blistering keynote address at the Inspectors of Mines Workshop, the Minister did not mince words, placing the blame squarely on preventable causes and warning rogue officials that corruption will be treated as a capital offence against workers’ lives.
“No ounce of gold, no tonne of coal, and no carat of diamond is worth a human life,” said Hon. Kambamura.
The disaggregation of the 64 fatalities is damning: 54 percent from ground collapses, 25 percent from improper use of explosives and gasing, 15 percent from falls into abandoned shafts, and 6 percent from electrocution and equipment incidents.
“These deaths are, in the overwhelming majority, preventable.
“They are not acts of God. They are the predictable consequence of unsafe practice and where there is unsafe practice, there must be a vigilant Inspector,” he said.
Hon. Kambamura issued three charges to the Inspectorate, beginning with a demand to modernise.
“Twentieth-century methodologies cannot regulate twenty-first-century mines.”
He then addressed the artisanal sector directly, “Where you find chaos, riverbed mining, undermining of public infrastructure, operating without title, exercise the full statutory authority vested in you by the Mines and Minerals Act. Issue prohibition orders without hesitation.”
But his sharpest warning was reserved for corruption within the Inspectorate itself.
“An Inspector who accepts a bribe to overlook a cracked tailings wall or a compromised ventilation system has signed a death warrant
“Let me be unequivocal, corruption in the Inspectorate will be treated as the blood crime that it is.”
The Minister announced an emergency USD 2 million resource envelope for a National Safety Enforcement Blitz, including funds for field vehicles, geotechnical lab equipment, and protective gear.
He also committed to confidential whistleblowing channels to protect honest inspectors facing intimidation.
“Our target is, and will remain, Zero Harm.
“So long as a single miner does not return home at the end of his or her shift, our work is unfinished.”
The workshop comes as Zimbabwe pushes to attract record investment in lithium, platinum and coal while grappling with a rising death toll in both large-scale and informal operations. The Minister demanded a culture shift from reactive policing to proactive safety enforcement.
