At 28 years of age, Mary (not her real name), thought she had finally gotten her life on track when she managed to purchase an excavator on hire purchase to enable her to start up her gold-mining business.
For months she slaved in the kitchen of her mining camp as the cook while her partner acted as the General Manager and his son operated the machine. There were in addition about five other workers. They managed to pay their monthly instalment as the land they worked on at that time was lucrative.
But then the gold ran out and today Mary is almost homeless, the machine has been repossessed stalling her business, she has no
