Economic Sabotage: Nigerian legislators summon Minister over loss of revenue to illegal mining

*The Federal lawmakers frown on performance of the Nigeria Mining Cadastre Office, saying its ‘revenue generation is low and not impressive at all’

Isola Moses | ConsumerConnect

In view of the reported activities of illegal resource miners, leading to a great loss of huge revenue in the country over time, the Nigerian Senate has summoned Arc. Olamilekan Adegbite, Honourable Minister for Mines and Steel Development, to shed more light on this development.

ConsumerConnect gathered the Joint Senate committee working on the 2022-2024 Medium-Term Expenditure Framework (MTEF) and Fiscal Strategy Paper (FSP) took the decision following the failure of Obadiah Nkom, Director-General of Nigeria Mining Cadastre Office, to furnish the Joint Committee with required explanations on the low revenues being generated in the mining sector, and the reported menace of illegal miners across the country.

Nkom, in his submissions before the Senate Joint Committee, had reportedly said that in 2019, the Office generated N2.58billion as revenue, and remitted same to the Consolidated Revenue Fund of the Federal Government.

The amount, he noted, reduced to N2.3billion in 2020 due to the outbreak of the Coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic, but that it had already started increasing in 2021 with N3.166billion realised as of July 2021, out of the targeted N4billion for this year.

Unfazed by Nkom’s submission, Senator Solomon Olamilekan Adeola, Chairman of the Senate Joint Committee, and other members wondered why the agency could not generate revenue beyond the threshold of N4billion to N5billion.

The Federal lawmaker stated: “The revenue generation is low and not impressive at all because big companies like Dangote Cement, BUA and others, with combined yearly profits of about N5trn, are under your purview.

“These are apart from other companies carrying out illegal mining activities across the country that are not captured in your revenue generation.”

Sen. Adeola said: “A lot of Chinese are involved in illegal mining in the country without your agency or any other one saddled with regulation of the sector, doing anything as far as licensing them and monitoring their explorations in form of collection of royalties are concerned.”