Women: The human mules of Congo’s gold mines

by GEORGINA CRANSTON

Lotsove Aduba, 27, a widow, pushes up to 60 kgs of rocks through a narrow tunnel inside Senzere mine. ‘Sometimes we feel dizzy because of a lack of food. I was carrying when i was pregnant.'” PHOTO/Georgina Cranston

Poverty and war have forced hundreds of women in the DR Congo’s gold-rich town of Mongbwalu in the east of the country to risk their lives working as ‘human mules’ deep inside disused mines. Women – some as young as 16 and others older than 50 – enter the mines to collect sacks of rocks weighing up to 60 kgs.

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