Former Commoner Residential Compound has since been integrated into Mahogo Village but is still known as Commoner Houses following the closure of Commoner Mine in the early 1990s. Commoner Houses as the place is called is about 600 meters from Columbina Rural Service Center, making it the second closest location to the service center.
Commoner Houses benefited a handful of lucky local people when Commoner Mine closed, including Mahogo Village head. Some workers at the current mining plant at the old Commoner Mine site reside in these houses, either as their own homes or as tenants.
Claims were first filed in 1890, and by 1982, the mine was developed to a vertical depth of 250 m. Gold production until 1947 amounted to 4009 kg. The Commoner orebody lies within the Commoner Formation, within the Bulawayan Group, 2.9-2.7 Ga. The Commoner Formation consists of andesitictuffs, carbonaceoussiltstones, and amygdaloidal andesitic lavas. The Commoner orebody is a tabular hydrothermalquartz-carbonatevein, averaging 1 m in thickness. Chalcopyrite, sphalerite, and galena are the common sulfide minerals associated with concentrations of gold. Later telluride mineralization includes native gold, Coloradoite and altaite.[4]
Commoner was named after Commoner Mine which was established during the Rhodesia era. The mine has been defunct for a decade but has since opened (2013) under a new name. Though the mine has another name, the name Commoner supersedes the later for it has become the name of a geographic place apart from the mine.
A couple of organizations have owned the mine at Commoner in the past, including Africa Gold, but currently May Jel Mining Company is operating at Commoner reclaiming the old mine dumps.
It is a requirement that an operating organisation should make profits and expand its own viability but still, it should benefit the local community in one way or the other.
Salakuhle School (misspelt Salagushle)[6] was changed to Commoner Primary School when the old Commoner Mine chipped in to help the upkeep of the school then. Commoner Primary School[7] is located 6.8 km from Commoner Stadium by air, on the other side of Empress MineinZhombe Ward 8 in Sitsha Village, south-east of Ngondoma Dam.[8]
Commoner Hall has since been converted into a church for a local Pentecostal Assembly.
Commoner Stadium is one of the ongoing service that the old Commoner Mine provided.
Commoner Houses have been occupied by more than two scores of villagers under Mahogo Village.
May Jel Mine operating at Commoner has since drilled boreholes outside its yard and villagers in Maisa, Mahogo and Nzama villages fetch clean water from these water-points.
Young people from these and other surrounding villages have found employment at the mine, easing the unemployment rate in the area, by a small but meaningful percentage.
^Twemlow, S.G. (1984). Foster, R.P. (ed.). Archaen gold-telluride mineralization of the Commoner Mine, Zimbabwe, in Gold '82: The Geology, Geochemistry and Genesis of Gold Deposits. Rotterdam: Geological Society of Zimbabwe, A.A. Balkema. pp. 469–478. ISBN906191504X.
^Duguid, Keith B. (1972) | The Structure and Petrology of the Commoner Mine below level 8. Special Honors Project, Univ. of Rhodesia.
^Ward 8 primary schools "Archived copy"(PDF). Archived from the original(PDF) on 2014-11-07. Retrieved 2014-12-14.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: archived copy as title (link)
