Those pictures show his village to be what looks about a kilometer or two from the pyramid. Are we to believe that no one from the antiquities bureau had ever thought to dig a couple holes around that entire area before?
Now I'm gonna take a wiid guess and say that someone knew where it was...and was waiting for an opportunity...it might have been the present owner.
The so-called Valley of the Golden Mummies (the name seems to have been Zahi’s idea) is a huge cemetery from Roman times (or perhaps a little earlier) with perhaps a million burials in it. It was discovered in the past 20 years when a tourist’s mule stepped on a soft spot and broke through. This guy digging a 33 foot hole was — like so many in Egypt — doubtless looking for antiquities to sell.