Illegal Mining: Truth, Pretension And National Security

For the umpteenth time, the issue of illegal mining and the money derived from it as the oxygen sustaining insecurity is on the front burner of public discourse.

Leading the charge one more time is the House of Representatives, which has commenced an investigation into the scale and patterns of illegal mineral exploitation across Nigeria.

Speaking at a high-level stakeholders’ workshop on extractive industry governance, the Speaker of the House of Representatives, Mr Tajudeen Abbas, observed that Nigeria cannot achieve economic diversification, fiscal stability, or job creation if the sector that should be a second revenue pillar is bleeding from illegality and opacity.

He told the meeting organised by the House of Representatives ad hoc committee on mineral exploitation, security, and anti-money laundering, in Abuja, that for too long, unpatriotic elements have been exploiting Nigeria’s vast mineral endowment.

The Speaker, however, added that “this is not an inquisition, it is a partnership, withhold nothing, speak plainly, proffer solutions. The success of this intervention depends on the quality information we receive and the sincerity of purpose we all bring to this room.”

Without prejudice to the deliberations at this stakeholders meeting, we are persuaded to argue that it will end as another talk shop with much sound and fury signifying nothing.

Our argument is based on the fact that activity in the sector involves the perceived high and mighty in society, with their foreign collaborators.

Consistently, Nigerians have raised concerns about the relationship between illegal mining and insecurity in the country. Like elsewhere in Africa, the mineral deposits are harvested under contrived situations that divert attention from the real issue of theft and outright criminality.

Like the argument about the chick and the egg, which came first, illegal mining thrives under the cover of confusion while at the same time providing the resources needed to finance the insecurity that makes it lucrative.

The stones harvested are taken out by air by the sponsors who arm the bandits. It is happening all around Africa, Nigeria inclusive.

The curious dimension is that the government is aware of what is going on and decides to turn a deaf ear and a blind eye for political reasons.

Aside from the insecurity component of this trade that is a drain on national revenue earning, is the process of the activity itself, crude and dangerous.

On several occasions, there have been reported cases of lead poisoning resulting in death and health impairment. Besides the hoopla in the media, which dies down soon enough, nothing happens to indicate genuine concern on the part of the authorities who are eager to sacrifice national interest on the altar of political expediency.

In the North, it is called illegal mining. In the south, it is called oil bunkering. Both involve the audacity of the powerful elite.

They stop at nothing to pursue their pecuniary interests, even if it involves environmental degradation and a threat to national security.

The difference is that the government and its agencies supervise the extraction of the crude oil and the revenue so derived goes into the public coffers. But the revenue generated from illegal mining in the North mostly goes into private pockets. That is the irony. The militants in the Niger Delta were and are still dispassionately dealt with, while the bandits who survive on the proceeds of illegal mining are treated as ‘prodigal sons’ and ‘our brothers’ who are to be deradicalised and rehabilitated.

The truth is that illegal mining is a mega-billion-dollar industry ruthlessly carried out by perceived politically-exposed persons with tentacles in every stratum of society. They carry on with the swagger of the untouchable, daring anyone to do their worst. They are positioned to get away with murder.

The pretension is the talk shop presently going on. This present National Assembly lack the moral standpoint to handle matters of this complexity. Their malleability is condemnable and gives the average Nigerian no hope of a decision that could possibly serve the common interest. Who needs a report produced by a rubber-stamp legislature? They know that whatever the outcome of the deliberation, it will end up on the shelf with a footnote from the power that be- seen.

In the meantime, national security continues to be imperilled as bandits, militants and their sponsors and godfathers grin ear to ear at the banks after laundering the proceeds through a compromised black market financial system.

Still, it is our view that the ongoing stakeholders meeting should be given the benefit of the doubt in the hope that the organisers would depart from the norm and give Nigerians a semblance of reason to believe that they are capable of restoring sanity in a sector that has the potential to be a sustainable national revenue earner.