Inside SA’s heist culture: gold, guns and gangs
Audacious armed robberies at SA’s gold smelting facilities ramped up dramatically in 2019. New developments suggest the gangs are refining their methods in response to new security measures
03 December 2020 - 05:00
On March 10, 20 armed men stormed a gold plant 140km west of Joburg operated by Village Main Reef (VMR), a Chinese-owned mining company. After hijacking a front-end loader, the gang overturned an armoured vehicle and broke through the wall of a smelt house, then made off with an undisclosed amount of calcine, the gold-bearing material from which bars of bullion are processed, according to industry sources.
VMR has confirmed the incident, but declined to comment, as the matter is under investigation...
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