LAST FLIGHT OF THE DIAMOND SMUGGLERS

Riding shotgun with an anti-smuggling, anti-pigeon militia on South Africa’s Diamond Coast.

- MATTHEW GAVIN FRANK

THE OPEN-TOPPED white Land Rover pulls up beachside on the outskirts of Port Nolloth, an isolated village on the Diamond Coast of South Africa. The vehicle is filled with four blond men with identical crew cuts, barrel chests, and fat faces, all in their mid-30s. They are friends of the former head of security for the local diamond mine, the frighteningly serious man I interviewed earlier today. He organized this ride for me. I climb in back and these men, perhaps because they refuse to be named, quickly lose their individual features, personalities. I will not remember their faces.

The men are dressed in yellow overalls, their hands on steering wheels or brandy bottles or the butts of shotguns. I sit on the flatbed’s metal bench between two of the men. It’s still afternoon, and they’re drunk, driving fast on these forbidden roads owned by the near-omnipotent De Beers mining conglomerate, stirring up the dust. We are mere specks in the middle of the Namaqualand region, 444,000 square kilometers of arid desert that encompass the western coasts of Namibia and South Africa.