Posted by By Tony Edike on
MINISTER of Solid Minerals Development, Dr Oby Ezekwesili says the over-dependence on oil as the sole source of revenue for the country portends great danger for the economy, saying necessary legal and legislative framework must be put in place for equitable exploration of various solid mineral deposits in the country.
ENUGU - MINISTER of Solid Minerals Development, Dr Oby Ezekwesili says the over-dependence on oil as the sole source of revenue for the country portends great danger for the economy, saying necessary legal and legislative framework must be put in place for equitable exploration of various solid mineral deposits in the country.
She said that it was in realization of this that the Obasanjo administration has resolved to revitalize the solid minerals sector by ensuring private participation with a view to making it revenue yielding since the sector had become competitive globally.
Speaking in Enugu after her maiden visit to the Nigerian Coal Corporation (NCC), Ezekwesili said the government had therefore given her ministry a marching order to seek ways of ensuring that all factors impeding the exploration and harnessing of the solid minerals were eliminated in the near future.
The minister said, 'We have got our marching order to work within the next couple of months to seeing that the very basic issues of legislative and physical framework that would enable the private sector be the leading light in the development of the solid mineral sector. This is simply because the mining sector is a globally competitive sector."
Ezekwesili added that the ministry has already carried a survey of the sector with the aim of identifying and evolving strategies that would attract private sector participation in the development of the sector, assuring that the neglect hitherto suffered by the sector would soon be a thing of the past.
'You cannot as a country revolve around your own nation preferences and issues; you have to have the right incentives that drive the private sector because global capital only goes to where there is friendliness towards it. So the legislative and physical frameworks are the things that we would be working on very appropriately to get it right. The other issue that is important is the reform of public mining institutions one of which is the Geological Survey, because investors need the basic geological information that would enable them begin to embark on prospecting exploration," she said.
According to her, the ministry would look at the issue of developing entrepreneurship as against the past practice where such monopoly was concentrated in the hands of the government, noting that the monopolies had made entry into the sector difficult. She said an aspect of her ministry's duty was to get the development of Nigerian entrepreneurs who would begin to look at mining as a source of productivity.