ALAKE ISSUES 90-DAY ULTIMATUM TO MIREMCO ON PERFORMANCE IMPROVEMENT, THREATENS SANCTIONS. (PHOTO).

 Alake issues 90-day ultimatum to MIREMCO on performance improvement, threatens sanctions

The Minister of Solid Minerals Development, Dr. Dele Alake has given the Mineral Resources and Environmental Management Committee (MIREMCO) a 90-day ultimatum to improve its performance or face severe sanctions from the federal government.

Speaking at the 2024 Annual General Meeting (AGM) of MIREMCO Chairmen, Dr. Alake expressed dissatisfaction with the agency’s current performance, emphasising that it is MIREMCO’s core responsibility to interface between sub-nationals, local communities, operators, and the federal government to minimise cases of conflict. ” The federal government is supposed to rely on your reports on the activities or inactivity of operators and whether they comply with environmental regulations and all other sundry regulations governing the sector. 

We are not impressed by the execution of that mandate, and we will not hesitate to wield the big stick if, after 90 days, the committee fails to turn a new leaf, “the minister asserted. Quoting from the Nigeria Minerals And Mining Act (NMMA) 2007, Section 19, sub-section 3g, which makes it mandatory for MIREMCO to act as a liaison between the subnational authorities, the local governments, the communities and the operators, Alake stressed that the provisions of the act has not been effectively executed by the committee.

According to the minister, “If provisions of the act had been effected by MIREMCO, the spate of interference that we witness by the subnationals, in some instance, local governments shutting down Mines, making policy pronouncements that are out-rightly unconstitutional would have been minimal. It is the failure of this body that has given rise to states dabbling into areas that are beyond their constitutional purview. ”