About 3,400 mining Licenses have been revoked by the Federal Government within the past 12 months. The Director-General of the Nigeria Mining Cadastre Office, Federal Ministry of Mines and Steel Development, Obadiah Simon, said this in Calabar during a sensitisation workshop for stakeholders in the South-South geopolitical zone on the adoption of the Electronic Mining Cadastre System.
“We have revoked 3400 mining licenses. We have the principle of ‘get a licence and use it’. If you do not use it you risk it being revoked. The affected miners did not comply with provisions of the Act, which are clearly spelt out for all to see.
“There is security of the tenure of license. The law specifies that we give 30 days notice through a registered letter and also gazette it. We will ensure that we exhaust all procedure leading to revocation of licences so that title holders do not blame us”, he said.
The DG also disclosed that the mining sector has abundant wealth for the country, maintaining that revenue from the sector over the years has been very astronomical.
About the Author
THEWILL Correspondent, Aniekan Bassey has over six years experience that spans across several fields in print journalism including development communication, sexual reproductive and health rights issues, crime, climate change, social justice, business and human interest stories.
