By ABAH ADAH, Abuja
The House of Representatives has decried inadequate budgetary provision for the Nigerian Mining Cadastre Office, NMCO, describing it as an aberration considering the steady increase in the agency’s revenue generation over the years.
The concern was raised when the MCO played host to the House Committee on Solid Minerals who paid an oversight visit to the headquarters of the agency on Tuesday in Abuja.
Speaking, Chairman of the committee, Hon. Jonathan Gaza Gbefwi, said it is of great concern that MCO being a very critical agency in the Nigerian mining ecosystem which had raised over N8 billion between 2023 and October 2024 would get an appropriation of N1 billion, stressing it is unacceptable and must be checked.
According to him, with the heart-gladdening revenue performance seen so so far on the part of the MCO, the agency would do much more with improved funding, more operation-friendly environment, and incentivised staff.
“And one issue that is of great concern to us, for an agency so critical in this ecosystem to be getting an appropriation of 1 billion, and you are raising, as of October, over 8 billion, to me, is a aberration, and it is something that must be checked.
“I believe if better equipment are procured, with more training and with better supervision of even the mining licensing, you should be able to make much more than this. You don’t have to wait and just advertise for annual returns. You should equally be able to be proactive.
“But what is of utmost importance to me is the fact that when you have an agency that is in charge of such a sensitive issue and your staff are not well incentivised, it will bring about sharp practices within the ranks and files of your staff whereby you may have people getting licenses without even obtaining consent from anywhere. Your appropriation is too low, but you need more funds to do more and to be proactive,” Gbefwi said.
He urged the management to take more seriously and ensure that the issue of getting the consent of stakeholders, especially host communities in acquiring mining licences is looked into as, according to him, consent poorly managed is a recipe for breakdown of law and order.
The law makers also advocated a situation where the MCO, in order to further improve on its performance, would have an office with one or two representatives in every state of the federation instead of only having an office in each of the six geopolitical zones of Nigeria.
Briefing the law makers earlier, the Director General of NMCO, Engr Obadiah Simon Nkom, appealed to them to look into regulations that would enable the agency retain at least a minute part of the revenue it generates to address some of the critical challenges being faced.
“From inception to date, the MCO has not been able to retain one kobo out of what it generates for its operations. But the most important thing for us and on which we are focused has been to overcome our challenges and move forward baring all challenges.
This implies that all the revenues generated by the agency are remitted to the federation account 100 percent.
“We recently had a review of fees, as approved by the Minister, and after that, the revenue increased, and that’s why you see that the revenue generated from January to October 2024 grew to over N8 billion, surpassing the one for the entire 2023,” Nkom said.
He noted that the secret of the agency’s success story hinges on the principles of transparency and accountability which it upholds, hinting that the agency works hand-in-hand with the Nigeria Extractive Industries Transparency Initiative, NEITI, in pursuit of that.
He intimated the law makers with the reforms embarked upon by the agency, narrating it transformed from the polygon system to Cadastre system and how the agency has now migrated online courtesy of its electronic Mining Cadastre System, eMC+, where people from all over the world can apply for license at any time and have their application processed real time.
A week ago, the similar committee in the upper, red, chamber of the National Assembly, NASS, the Senate, were on their oversight visit to the MCO during which they expressed strong concerns over zero release of capital appropriation, put at over N550 million, to the agency, describing it as unacceptable and pledging to look into it.
