The South West And The Reforms In The Mining Sector

Address by the Honorable Minister of Solid Minerals Development, Dr. Dele Alake at the South West Leaders Conference in Akure, Ondo State on Wednesday October 29, 2025

Protocols.

Today is historic in the annals of our crusade for a Nigeria that works for the people by enabling us to realize the objectives set out in the last stanza of our National Anthem to build a nation where no man is oppressed, and so, with peace and plenty, Nigeria may be blessed.

The Renewed Hope Agenda of your son, President Bola Ahmed Tinubu is the contract with the Nigerian people. It seeks to revive the hope that Nigerians voted for on June 12, 1993, encapsulated in the manifesto of President Moshood Kashimawo Abiola of blessed memory, the welfarist manifesto aptly titled, Farewell to Poverty.

The Renewed Hope Agenda is a potent declaration that those who conspired to murder the hope of the oppressed that MKO symbolized only killed the body. They could not kill the mission and the vision of the man who gave hope to the hopeless and brought smiles to homes and communities all over the world. It is a stoic acknowledgment that the struggle for the development of the Nigerian State as a country whose immense resources have positioned to be the giant of Africa, must continue.

All of us in the Federal Executive Council are privileged to be led by a man of vision, a workaholic who thinks on his feet, the financial genius who constantly innovates the economy, the political titan whose grasp of the logistics and permutations of power has no equal.

At the Ministry of Solid Minerals Development, we followed the path of the President by developing the Seven Point Agenda to position the Solid MInerals Sector for domestic consolidation and international competiveness. This entailed reforms designed to clean the sector’s Augean stable of inefficiencies and dysfunctional values and processes.We brought to bear the values of Omoluabi, the values of probity and integrity, compliance with the law and consequences for violation, inclusion and fairness, to the art and craft of governing the mining sector.

Today, we can beat our chest and declare that our reforms are successful. True, there is still much to be done but the trajectory is progressive and even, in several ccases, revolutionary.

Insecurity was a major headache. In Niger, Kebbi and Kogi states, artisanal miners clashed with bandits as farmer-herder confrontations ensued. In Zamfara state, recurrent bandit attacks on gold mining communities, targeting of miners for kidnapping, extortion and raids were so prevalent that the Buhari administration banned mining .

In collaboration with my brother, the Minister of Interior, Dr. Bunmi Tunji-Ojo, we established the Mining Marshals from the Nigerian Security and Civil Defence Corps. The Mining Marshals has restored over 90 mining sites, illegally occupied by bandits to the legitimate licensees and is prosecuting over 300 violators of the Nigerian Mining and Minerals Act. The restoration of relative order in the sector is evident in the decision of President Tinubu to lift the ban on mining in Zamfara State after the five-year ban.

And we are not resting on the oars. We are putting in place the mines satellite monitoring project. This project, approved by the Federal Executive Council, with an initial take-off fund of N2.5 billion, has captured all the mineral licences and co-ordinates in the country and will monitor movement of persons and trucks in the minerals areas to detect unlicensed, illegal operations and report revenue accruable to the Federal Government from minerals transported from one place to another.

The gradual restoration of security, law and order, also supported by the bold conquest of invaders and destruction of insurrectionists by the Nigerian Army, Navy and Air Force has encouraged miners to return to their sites. The resumption of legal extraction and operations has increased the number of persons employed, the royalties and fees paid and boosted government revenue.

Against the paltry figure of N8.6 billion collected by the Federal Government from mining in 2022, as soon as we rolled out our reforms on assumption of office, the figure rose to N14.9 billion in 2023. As we introduced more measures, it rose to N38 billion in 2024. And it is with pride that I announce authoritatively that, between January and September, this year, we have recorded over N30 billion as total revenue and South-West contributed N7.2 billion, making it the highest contributor to mining revenues of the Federal Government.

The South- West region is well-positioned to benefit from these reforms. First, it has the most successful gold mining project in Nigeria: the Segilola/Thor project, that in 2024, declared a turnover of $193 million dollars at its international headquarters. It employs, over 2,000 workers and 80 percent of them are youths below 40 years. Segilola pays the highest tax and royalties in the gold mining subsector. And much of this credit for growing Nigeria’s face in the global gold sector goes to your son, Segun Lawson, the Chairman and Chief Executive Officer.Second, with massive mineral deposits given by Olodumare, South West has gold, lithium, limestone, granite, clay, silica sand, feldspar, kaolin, laterite, quartz, mica, beryllium and the world’s best gemstones. Our people are showing interest and are active in the mining sector. Our records show that companies from the South-west hold 1,801 mineral titles out of the 9,592 nationwide. These include 630 exploration licences, 51 mining leases, 284 quarry leases and 836 small scale mining leases. As at October 15, this year Ogun has the highest number of titles with 481, followed by Oyo, 440 and Osun, 374.

The fact that the South West has the largest concentration of quarry leases in the country also explains the concentration of companies manufacturing mining explosives. The Solar Niga Chem and Intrachem operate from Ogun State and feed the mining sector through dealer firms such as Dynatrach and Tuntise.

I am glad that our people are fully involved in the mining value chain. We have issued licences for 46 private mineral buying centres centres and 369 co-operatives with 5,734 members. I must emphasize that establishing co-operatives is the non-kinetic component of our strategy to secure the sector by reducing illegal mining. Osun has the highest number of co-operatives with 158 comprising 1,648 members followed by Lagos, (77) and Oyo (47). Currently, we digitising the register of co-operatives by taking their co-operatives. Not less than 80 has been captured in the South-West so far.

While we encourage more investment in the country, we insist that our people should not be cheated. We encourage all communities on mineral bearing land in Nigeria to set up committees that can engage investors to negotiate the compulsory Community Development Agreement, CDA. The law is very clear: a mining company must sign a CDA, stating in clear terms, how it intends to impact the development of the mining community before commencing mining.From our records, 99 CDAs have been signed in South West till date. Significantly, not less than 45 communities in the South-West signed CDA between September 2023 and now, indicating the aggressiveness with we have implemented the policy by doubling the CDA record of over 15 years in just two years!

As part of the Seven Point Agenda, we set up the Nigerian Solid Minerals Company as successor in title to the defunct Nigerian Mining Corporation. The company, currently under the Ministry of Finance Incorporated, is expected to have a private sector orientation by having 50 per cent shares of mega mining companies, 25 per cent of the Federal Government and 25 percent of Nigerian shares by IPO.

This company will engage in joint venture projects with local and international investors on brown and green fields, encourage skills transfer and promote gainful employment of Nigerians to create the capital formation necessary to reposition the sector as Nigeria’s next major revenue earner.

Our reforms of the rates regime in licences and royalties have accelerated sectoral stability and boosted revenue. The revocation of 3,794 titles of defaulting and dormant companies have reduced speculation and attracted serious investors. The increase in administration of licence fees and royalties have raised the bar of industrial consciousness by encouraging mergers and acquisitions.

Again, the results are evident in the revenues of the Mining Cadastral Office, that, in one year doubled from N6billion in 2023 to N12.5 billion in 2024. In fact, from January to last week, the figure increased again by about 110 per cent with the record of N26.7 billion revenue. As we approach the end of the year, we are confident that we shall achieve more.

Ladies and gentlemen, our progress at home has been matched with renewed vigour and creativity in attracting investors to Nigeria abroad. Our campaign for value addition, first articulated at the Future Minerals Forum in January, 2024, inspired Ministers of Mining in Africa to set up the Africa Minerals Strategy Group and I was unanimously elected the pioneer Chairman of the AMSG. The gospel of value addition is spreading like wild fire across Africa as more countries abandon the unprofitable and devastating raw minerals export policy for the industrial, job -creating, skills -transferring value addition.

The implementation of this policy by our administration has produced new start-up projects in processing. These include the impending groundbreaking of the $400 million Africa’s largest rare earth plant, the lithium processing plants of Asba Company, Canmax Technology, Avatar New Energy Nigeria Company, totaling $1.7 billion Foreign Direct Investment.

When we consider the multiplier effects of these numerous developments, we will not be surprised by the recent reports of statistical agencies and economic monitors such as the Nigerian Bureau of Statistics, NBS and the Nigerian Extractive Industry Transparency Initiative, NEITI. The NBS reported that overall growth of the sector rose from 2.84 per cent in 2023 when we took over to 4.85 per cent in 2024. It added that contribution to aggregate GDP moved from 5.56 to 5.64 percent in the period.

I wish to conclude by appealing to the local traditional and modern authorities in Nigeria generally and South West in particular to join our campaign against illegal mining, support for co-operatives and value addition. As it is said, our past is a story already told, our future shall be written in gold.

Thank you for listening.

Dr. Dele Alake

Minister of Solid Minerals Development