TheCable

The federal government says it will improve procedures, documentation and regulations in the solid mineral sector in order to recover unpaid royalties.

Speaking on Monday at the stakeholders’ consultative forum on the review of the draft mineral exports’ guidelines and documentation requirements, Zainab Ahmed, minister of finance, budget and national planning, said the policy has become more urgent in view of the present economic challenges occasioned by the COVID-19 pandemic, as well as volatility of global oil prices.

“This effort, therefore, is another of such deliberate federal government policy measure that is aimed at developing its monumental mining potentials and minimising dependency on oil as the nation’s continues her drive towards a progressively diversified economic base,” she said.

A statement by Yunusa Tanko Abdullahi, special adviser to the finance minister on media and communications, quoted Ahmed as saying streamlining the operations of the sector would help guarantee proper regulation of the sector and promote the deployment of appropriate technology/expertise to determine the quantity and value of minerals mined and exported.

“In addition, it would facilitate the collection of all the royalties/fees due to government from the export, ensure the integrity of data and determine the possible mineral derivation to their states of origin,” Ahmed said.

“It is envisaged that developing a more regulated mineral sector would obviously create conducive environment that would significantly enhance mining business in Nigeria.”

She noted that the collection of guidelines has been designed to minimise revenue leakages and remove undue bottlenecks experienced in the process of transactions by both exporters of minerals and government regulatory agencies.

Ahmed explained that Section 22 and 23 of the Pre-shipment Inspection Export Acts No. 10 of 1996 empowers the finance minister, as the chairman of the Nigerian Export Supervision Scheme, to issue directive and guidelines as may be required for discharging the objective of the act.

She said the act requires that no goods shall be exported from Nigeria except an inspecting agent appointed by government has issued in respect of the goods a clean certificate of inspection (CCI).

Also speaking at the event, Olamilekan Adegbite, minister of mines and steel development, expressed his conviction that the implementation of the guidelines would go a long way to bringing sanity to the solid mineral extractive industry, and further informed direct investors’ decision.

The proposed document, according to Adegbite, would reduce the usual time for an export cycle from an uncertain current timeframe to 26 working days. Of these, the processing of exit point documentation and shipment will take five and three working days respectively, as desired by the Presidential Enabling Business Environment Council (PEBEC).

He called on stakeholders to acquaint themselves with the provisions of the guidelines and take advantage of the environment created by it to foster their businesses.