Saturday, April 27, 2024

Nigeria revokes 924 dormant mining titles, seeks new investors

Reuters | April 24, 2024 | 

Idanre Hills, Nigeria. Stock image.

Nigeria has revoked 924 dormant mining titles immediately and invites investors to freely apply for the affected licences which will be offered on a “first come, first served” basis, its minister of mines said on Wednesday.


The affected titles include 528 exploration licences, 20 mining leases, 101 quarry licences, and 273 small-scale mining licences, Mines Minister Dele Alake said in a statement.

In November, more than 1,600 mining titles were revoked for non-payment of statutory fees as part of sweeping reforms in the sector.


Alake said the action was taken to curb “licence racketeering” where companies or individuals secure titles that hold minerals of commercial value and then offer the licences to the highest bidder.

“By creating a secondary, black market to pawn mineral licences, the unsuspecting and unwary investor is misled into believing that he can only obtain licence by patronizing the black market. This discourages investment,” Alake said.

“It is our belief that this decision will sanitize the licensing system by penalizing those who have commercialized the opportunities offered by the sector into a bazaar, he added.

Nigeria is seeking to woo investors to a mining industry that has long been underdeveloped, offering incentives such as tax waivers and full repatriation of profits to investors.

In the past, Nigeria has struggled to extract value from its vast mineral resources due to neglect and lack of investments.

Africa’s top oil producer, which is also rich in lithium, gold and limestone, will grant mining licences to only companies that process their minerals locally after toughening licensing rules for foreign companies last year.

(By Camillus Eboh; Editing by Elisha Bala-Gbogbo and Jonathan Oatis)


Glencore mulls mining investments in Nigeria

Miner and commodities giant Glencore (LON: GLEN) said on Friday the company was looking at investing in Nigeria’s mining sector, provided the government guarantees a stable business environment. 

CEO, Gary Nagle, who met the country’s minister responsible for solid minerals, Dele Alake, said his company is especially interested in nickel, cobalt, zinc and other metals.

This visit coincides with Nigeria’s efforts to attract foreign investors to its underdeveloped mining sector.

Blake highlighted the federal government’s push to attracting major international companies in order to accelerate the growth of the mining sector, similar to what the nation did with its oil industry.

“We are offering tax waivers on imported equipment; policy of full repatriation of profits to home countries; removing bottlenecks to ease of doing business. The ministry is also ready to address any concerns that Glencore might have to facilitate smooth operations in Nigeria,” Alake said.

The government cancelled this week inactive licenses and announced that it will only issue new mining licenses to companies that engage in local mineral processing

Glencore has had business in Nigeria in the past, which ended with corruption charges and penalties.

Between 2007 and 2018, Glencore inked multiple agreements to buy crude oil and refined products from Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC) and its subsidiaries. 

The UK Serious Fraud Office said in 2022 that Glencore had paid more than $28 million in bribes across five African countries, including Nigeria, over five years to 2016. An English judge handed down a penalty of £276 million ($345 million) for Glencore’s corrupted conduct.

Nigeria, Africa’s leading energy producer, has faced challenges in extracting value from its vast mineral resources. This has been largely due to insufficient incentives and neglect of the mining sector. As a result, the country’s underdeveloped mining industry contributes less than 1% to Nigeria’s gross domestic product.

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