The solid minerals sector has not been given deserved attention over the years by successive administrations. But there has been a move by the present administration to explore the country’s abundant solid minerals which are majorly being exploited by unscrupulous native and foreign interests. In this interview with ISAAC SHOBAYO, the National President, Miners Association of Nigeria (MAN), Mr. Dele Ayanleke, speaks on the ongoing reform in the sector, illegal mining, banditry, and conflict of interests, among other issues. Excerpt:

AS a stakeholder, what is your assessment of the ongoing federal government’s reforms in the mining sector?

Around 2007, when the reform initiatives in the mining sector were coming up, it was in the year that the New Minerals and Mining Act was promulgated, and since then, there have been a lot of reforms that the government has been putting in place to make sure that the sector is repositioned. And everybody has realized that if this sector must deliver on the wealth creation agenda for the nation, we need to add value. So this transportation of minerals cannot help us; they are creating industries and employment in other societies, and we are short-changing ourselves here. The current minister has actually made it a policy that for anybody to be given a licence now, there must be a plan for value addition. This is one of his agenda: to make sure that the wealth is actually created and that we are able to track this revenue to the government for other development. I think the government is trying to put up policy initiatives, but the only problem is the implementation of these policies. That is where you have issues. All the regulatory agencies and departments that are supposed to implement all these policies are incapacitated. There is a low level energy capacity for them to be effective, and that is why we have been telling the government about the need to invest more in the sector.

At the moment, there is an influx of foreigners, especially Asians, in the sector, and there is a belief that these people are equally fuelling illegal mining. What is your position on this?

It is like one Yoruba adage, which says that erosion will always attempt to pull down a structure, but it is the duty of the owner of the structure to ensure that the calamity does not happen by fortifying the foundation of the structure to make sure that erosion does not destroy his property. These people are not ghosts; they are human beings. We have to re-examine our policy, and we have to sensitize all the mining host communities as well. Once our lands are devastated as a result of this illegal operation, who will reclaim them later? Do we expect someone like the government that did not benefit from it to come and reclaim them later? We need a lot of sensitization for the mining host communities. And we have this issue of very low capacity for the regulatory agencies to actually do their work. For example, let us look at a state like Niger that is as big as the southeastern part of Nigeria. If [the state mining agency] has only one mining officer, one malfunctioning vehicle, and a lot of mining locations, how do you expect that agency to carry out its functions appropriately? There is no doubt about it that if there is an influx of foreign miners, some of our policies would also have allowed what is happening. Any foreign miner is allowed to own a mining asset by two hundred percent and to repatriate whatever he gets out of it. But one danger we need to control is the raw exportation of our minerals. Like the first question you asked about value addition, if you allow these raw minerals to be [shipped] out, of course, what we want to have, the kind of benefits we want to accrue from the solid minerals sector will definitely not happen, because raw material exportation means that you are creating employment, you are creating value, you are creating wealth in other nations, and we are short-changing ourselves here. We have to look at our policies. And also, we have to carry out sensitization for all these mining communities and, at the same time, improve our human and material capacity for all the regulatory agencies to do their work very well.

In the northern part of this country, one of the issues besetting the mining sector is the issue of banditry. In some states, these elements are gradually taking over mining locations. It seems like there is no proper regulatory framework for mining. What are your suggestions on this menace?

If you go to our website, you will see a lot of policies that are there. It is not a matter of not having a regulatory body; even with the mineral policies that the National Assembly is trying to review, there is substantially nothing wrong with those laws. We are simply having problems with the implementation of these laws and policies. Banditry is not a very good narration, but it is not limited to the mining sector in Nigeria. Banditry is everywhere. For example, before these people invaded our mining locations, Boko Haram was there; it was not banditry that brought them there. Banditry is not happening in the mining sector alone; we have it in oil and gas. The issue is the security architecture of our nation, which the government must address directly.

From all indications, it appears there are no accurate mining data to attract local and foreign investors to the sector.

Well, there is none, but I think there are efforts being made towards that. A few years ago, there was an initiative to generate data that would attract investors to the Nigerian solid minerals sector, and that is why some of the money from the World Bank loan given to Nigeria under the mining data project was deployed towards generating data. So there was a programme known as the National Integrated Minerals Exploration Programme. During last year’s mining week, what they were able to do was to showcase to the world the mining week, which was commissioned by the Secretary to the Government of the Federation on behalf of the president. And if you look at the agenda of the current Minister of Solid Minerals Development, he said one of the agenda items is to generate one big piece of data, that is data that would speak in terms of volumes and quantities and specific locations of [specific mineral resources] that would lead to business decision-making processes. Generating data is money, and he said that in the whole of Africa, Nigeria’s budget for data generation is the lowest. Other nations that are actually making waves in this sector have budgeted substantial amounts of money for data generation because data generation is money. Without data, money will not come.

Sir, at the moment, there is a conflict of interest between the states and the federal government over mining activities. How can this be addressed within the existing legal framework?

There is always conflict. Even in the oil and gas sector, which happens to be the mainstay of the Nigerian economy, there are conflicts. My advice to the federal government is that it should treat this conflict the same way it is still resolving the conflict of interest in the oil and gas sector, because what we are experiencing in the mining sector did not happen in the oil and gas sector. We did not hear that the state governments are establishing their own structures and policies to regulate oil and gas. No state government has come up in the Niger Delta to say it is banning one oil company from operating, and resources are resources. The constitution places the ownership and management of natural resources under the purview of the Federal Republic of Nigeria, as contained in an exclusive legislative list. Presently, the National Assembly and the Ministry [of Solid Minerals] are trying to review the current legal framework. What I will advise is that the state government should put whatever their agitations are on the table for everybody to know. Because if they are coming to the centre every month to share money from oil and gas, I think it is wisdom that they also should bring whatever they have to be shared by all. But now wanting to control their own solid minerals might bring a constitutional crisis. In the news some days ago, the Bayelsa State governor said that he would no longer accept a situation whereby he would bring his own resources to Abuja to come and share. This is what such a scenario can generate. We have been telling the federal government to listen to states over this matter. Even cases like environmental degradation, insecurity, and the issue of revenue from the oil sector are actually addressed in the present Nigeria Minerals and Mining Act 2007, but the gap can be bridged through the normal democratic process. The National Assembly can propose amendments to the constitution in this regard; this is our position. But for every individual state coming up with it’s own individual regulations, and we say we are inviting big investors, no serious investor will come and invest in that kind of confused regulatory process. So there is a need for the three tiers of government to be on the same page as far as mining regulation is concerned in Nigeria.

But having obtained the required licence from the cadastral office, investors often encountered problems with the chiefs and district heads, among others, at the local level. This often resulted in litigation. What is the way out of this scenario?

The problem is that in some cases, as I said earlier, we have to review some policies. Some people can sit down anywhere in the world and go to the websites of the Cadastral office and apply, and if he applied, some people have already taken their own application from the grassroots by making sure that they contacted the land owner first, so when the person who has not seen the land owner but has a licence comes up, there will definitely be a crisis. As we are going digital, we must take into consideration some things at the local level.

If the sector is properly regulated, what would be your estimation in terms of revenue generation for the country?

It would be very difficult to put a figure on that, even if the data we are talking about are available. But one thing that we need to know is that unlike other mineral resources that are domiciled in one region, solid minerals are everywhere. There is hardly any local government in Nigeria without one solid mineral or the other, even in commercial quantity. One thing that we know is that, if that sector is well developed, it is capable of generating enough employment for our youth, and the japa syndrome will be addressed. By the time people are employed, there will be peace; social vices will reduce drastically, and wealth will be generated. And if it is well managed, the revenue accruing from the sector can also improve our GDP and make it possible for the government to have more money for development and capital projects that will benefit the economy.