She said that when she first left Likasi in the mid-1980s, there was no artisanal mining taking place. The original Belgian copper mines were run by Gécamines, and most of the men who lived in Likasi and Kambove worked at them. After Gécamines closed the mines, people started digging for themselves. “At that time, what they earned from the copper was enough,” Solange said. “We did not have to send our children to dig.”
