It was a difficult moment for the military and police authorities as they had to defend an allegation of complicity in illegal mining, thus denying the government the needed income and collaborating with the people who are appropriating the wealth of the country. The Chief of Defence Staff (CDS), Gen. Christopher Musa and the Inspector General of Police, Kayode Egbetokun said the allegation is unfounded. They were giving testimony before House of Representatives Committee on Mineral Resources. It was at a hearing by the House of Representatives Committee on Mineral Resources, chaired by Hon. Jonathan Gaza, with stakeholders on illegal mining.
The testimonies of the two service chiefs were a response to a query by the Committee Chairman, who said that reports at their disposal suggested that some members of the Armed Forces and the police were providing security for illegal miners.
Musa, represented by the Director of Operations at Defence Headquarters, Air Vice Marshal Nnaemeka Ilo, clarified that they only protect legitimate requests made by legitimate miners, especially in conflict-inflicted areas.
He emphasised that, contrary to the allegation of collusion, the Armed Forces of Nigeria are prepared to give all the necessary support needed to stop illegal mining.
He said: “It is not our primary duty but part of our responsibility as per the constitution is that whenever the civil authority asks us to do something, we have no obligation than to do that. So, the Armed Forces convey here that we are ready to support all the agencies involved in stopping illegal mining including the civil defence, police and the Ministry and so on.
“Now to the question that you asked if the military is protecting any minefield or illegal miners. Most of the time, you find out that from reports reaching us from reliable sources the military and police protect illegal miners.
“I want to state categorically clearly that this is a fallacy. It is not true. If there are any such allegations, please we would want to know which of the mines or who brought the allegations so that we can take it up from there. If there is any such allegation, we want to know who brought that up, but as it is, they are pure lies, sir.
“Legitimate requests are made for the military to give protection to legitimate miners that licences have been issued to in conflict-inflicted areas. Once we get such requests what we normally do is we would write to the Ministry of Mines.
“In fact, we direct them to (direct) their letter to the Ministry of Mines. So, if the Ministry of Mines requests us because of the nature of the environment, because of the conflict, we do sometimes give protection to those people licensed by the government to carry out mining activities from the Ministry of Mines based on requests from the Ministry.”
Also, the Inspector General of Police who was represented by Assistant Inspector General of Police, AIG Ademola Hamzat, said no responsible organization paid by the public would do anything that would be against the wish of the people.
He said: “The police, yes, we give guards to some individuals, who we can establish are under serious threat, especially in terrorism-inflicted areas. But from my own office, there is nothing to show that we protect any illegal mining site. We don’t do that.
“We have a procedure to even grant whoever we are going to guard. The procedure should be we should know what you do for a living first and you must be able to establish to us what the reasons are, reasons you want personal guard because the police are supposed to provide general service to the people.
“So, if the people who actually give this, which is coordinated by the Inspector General of Police himself, are convinced that you are supposed to be given one or two guards for personal protection, they would grant. But none from my investigation that we have any mine that we so protect.”
The committee chairman, Gaza, said Nigerians need to know that they are making efforts to nip the problem in the bud.
