Nigerians should not be poor: Experts canvass renewed focus on solid minerals

Specialists on exploitation of solid minerals for personal and communal wealth have canvassed renewed focus on development of the sector.

The specialists, at a summit and exhibition on solid minerals in the Adamawa State capital, Yola, lamented gaps in knowledge of the potentials of solid minerals and acute inadequacy of investments in the sector by government and development institutions.

The Convener of the North East 2025 Africa Mineral Summit & Exhibition, Dr John Pakka, said, “With so much mineral wealth, Nigerians have no business being poor. The Overwhelming majority of Nigerians do not know anything about solid minerals. We do not know the viability of what we have.”

Singling out Adamawa State, Pakka said, “The minerals around the state are more than enough to enrich everybody. We have more than 50 different minerals: industrial minerals, gemstones and other types of rare earth minerals. Those of us living in the villages, around rocks and such places, we think these stones are ordinary. We do not know that they are fortunes.”

He said the solid minerals summit and exhibition, holding in Yola from Tuesday February 25 to Wednesday February 26, is intended to spread the message of wealth creation through solid minerals exploitation and value addition.

The chairman of the event, Professor Bashir Aliu, said the potential of solid minerals are unbelievably high but very little known or appreciated.

“We have so much mineral wealth only to live in abject poverty,” Bashir Aliu lamented, saying only a few halfhearted efforts have been made by authorities to develop the solid minerals sector.

“Adamawa can provide the entire country its aluminium needs but Adamawa has no single company to mine aluminium,” he said, recommending a change in attitude to the development of the solid minerals sector.