Wednesday, May 17, 2023

Life inside the South African gangs risking everything for copper

Monica Mark’s reporting is smart, informative, and empathetic in this piece delving into the world of the thieves who risk it all, not for gold — but for copper.

The copper thieves were known as izinyoka, “snakes” in Zulu, and they barely made a sound as they prepared early one morning. On the porch of a rundown breezeblock home in Johannesburg’s largest township, the three men pulled on their disguise of municipal workers’ coveralls, then shared a smoke. The air filled with clouds of nyaope, a cocktail of black-tar heroin cut with marijuana, rat poison and antiretroviral drugs.



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