Eye on the Gold

South African gold funded the British Empire and its wars. The gold industry was the prime beneficiary of the apartheid system, and left legacies of social breakdown, impoverishment and environmental degradation. Production peaked in 1970 and is now in terminal decline; remaining ore reserves are too deep, too expensive and too dangerous to extract.

With the support of Archbishop-Emeritus Desmond Tutu, Terry launched the New York banking sanctions campaign against apartheid in 1985 as a last...