Operation Transparency, a government action aimed at combating diamond trafficking and illegal immigration, brought additional difficulties for those who see the possibility of getting out of poverty in the "camanga" (diamond).
Many, without a license, continue to defy the rules and try to evade the surveillance of security guards at Sociedade Mineira do Cuango (SMC), the diamond company owned by the state-owned Endiama and which exploits diamonds in the area.
Some try to bribe security guards, others are caught and beaten, many end up dead in the Cuango River, say sources contacted in Cafunfo by Lusa.
"We depend on diamond mining, but whenever we go in the woods we don't have the chance to work. We pay, but the security of the Cuango mining company always comes, they start to chase me away and seize the materials and, lately, the race always causes deaths near the Cuango River, many people die there ", complains Dorício Joaquim Almeida, unemployed and resident of the Ngulue neighborhood.
Soba (traditional authority) Gonçalves Daniel recognizes that diamonds are a wealth for the people.
But he says that the Government has given guidelines so that the people do not approach the mining area, operated by SCM, a company that in the book "Diamantes de Sangue", by activist and journalist Rafael Marques, is associated with human rights abuses, corruption and destruction of peasants' fields.
"You can only dig from a distance, the government said, you can only dig diamonds 50, 100 kilometers away," he stresses.
Operation Transparency "forced people to withdraw and took the Congolese brothers to the borders, but still people continue to return, there are many who are digging," he adds.
The stones are sold to foreigners, especially Senegalese, "who have more money and can buy diamonds," according to Soba.
In Cafunfo, the modest homes of these buyers stand out in the midst of widespread misery. They are the only ones painted and arranged, they are defended by security guards and surrounded with barbed wire, showing the economic status of its residents, which stands out in the poverty of the mining town of Lunda Norte.
Before Operation Transparency, the most expensive diamonds were sold, admits Gonçalves Daniel. Today, "there is no good price".
Most young people do not have a job because there are also no companies where they can work. "The only company we have is the Cuango mine, but few are there," he says.
Almost the entire population, especially the older ones, dedicate themselves to "cultivation", while young people try their luck in mining.
"But when they go there they are chased away, they cannot get close to the mine, that is the reality. If they are caught, they beat and expel them," says the soba.
Dorício Joaquim Almeida regrets that the Government does not keep its promises. "The Cuango municipal administration called on shopkeepers to make a contribution from the roads and, in fact, they charged the amounts, but they are not making the roads, we have been doing this for ten years", he tells Lusa.
In the neighborhood where he lives, a few kilometers from the center of Cafunfo, there are no cars driving on the almost impassable and garbage-strewn roads where, despite poverty, the children's joy seems to bring with them the hope of better days.
There, practically everyone walks on foot and some young people skillfully swing their motorbikes between the shoulders of the dirt road.
The road that passed through the neighborhood opened years ago in a huge ravine that the rain and sloppiness increased until it became an insurmountable danger.
"They never solved it, the machines are stopped, they lied, they promised jobs to the youth and so far there are no jobs", criticizes the young man.
Just over a week ago, several residents of Cafunfo lost their lives in a confrontation with the police. The death toll varies between six, according to the police and 25, according to protest organizers.
The authorities say it was an "act of rebellion" because it allegedly involved 300 members of the Lunda Tchokwe Protective Movement, but non-governmental organizations and Catholic bishops considered the events to be a "massacre".
Fed up with promises, many residents of Cafunfo assume revolt and dissatisfaction with the conditions in which they live, but prefer not to speak.
The lack of a road worthy of the name was pointed out as one of the main reasons for the protest that had a deadly outcome.
