THE Presidential Artisanal Gold Mining Development Initiative (PAGMI) was conceived by the Federal Government as a means of transforming the country’s abundant, largely untapped gold deposits into a major source of revenue for the country.

But controversy surrounding the establishment of a gold reserve by the Zamfara State government, and reports of the purchase of gold from the state by the Central Bank of Nigeria under the PAGMI arrangement, has ressurected the age-long clamour for resource control by oil producing states of the Niger Delta.

PAGMI is a comprehensive artisanal and small-scale gold mining development programme, launched in 2019 to foster the formalisation and integration of artisanal, or illegal, gold mining activities into Nigeria’s legal, economic, and institutional framework. It w‎as ‎designed as a broader strategy to address the structural and institutional factors such as rural poverty, lack of alternative livelihoods, and difficulties in meeting legal and regulatory requirements that tend to push artisanal gold mining operators deeper into the informal economy.‎

‎The provision of access to markets for the artisanal miners through a National Gold Purchase Program and the deployment of enhanced mining methods at artisanal and small-scale mining sites are to serve as ‎catalysts for the planned integration.

‎In line with the National Gold Purchase Program, the ‎Central Bank of Nigeria will be purchasing gold that has been mined, processed and refined under the Presidential Artisanal Gold Mining Development Initiative for use as part of Nigeria’s external reserves.‎

Offering more insight on PAGMI, the Federal Ministry of Information and Culture, on its website, explained, “‎PAGMI will deploy safer and more efficient mining and processing technologies across artisanal mining locations across the country, starting with Kebbi and Osun States as the Pilot States with intervention in Kaduna, Zamfara and Niger States to commence immediately after the Pilot.

“Using a Centralised Off-take and Supply System supported by a Decentralised Aggregation and Production Network, PAGMI will buy all the gold produced by artisanal and small-scale miners and aggregated by licensed buying centers and aggregators for supply to the Central Bank of Nigeria.”

A major feature of PAGMI, the biometric data capture and enrolment exercise for artisanal miners, kicked-off in Yauri Local Government Area of Kebbi State in February.

However, controversy is trailing the implementation of PAGMI after the announcement by the Zamfara State government that it had established a gold reserve was followed by reports that the CBN is to purchase N5 billion worth of gold from the state government.

‎Under the PAGMI arrangement, the CBN had, earlier in July 2020, paid the sum of N268m for 12.5kg of locally mined gold bars.

Also, in August, 2020, Zamfara State governor, Dr. Bello Matawalle, visited the Presidential Villa, Abuja, to present gold bars mined in the state to President Muhammadu Buhari.

‎Then, in October 2020, Matawalle announced, at a press briefing in Gusau, that Zamfara has established a ‘gold reserve’ with gold that was, reportedly, entirely mined and refined by artisanal miners in the state. The gold reserve, the first of its kind in Nigeria, was launched with 31kg of processed gold that is to be deposited in a bank.

The governor explained that the establishment of the gold reserve would boost the economy of the state.

“My administration will subsequently continue to buy gold from our local miners so as to gradually improve the reserve. ‎Even though our state, like other states of the Federation, is grappling with competing demands from the public, the resources at our disposal are meagre. We feel it is of utmost significance to invest in the future of our people.

“The establishment of the gold reserve, therefore, is part of the relentless efforts by my administration to diversify the state’s economy by exploring all potentials of the state, and maximally utilising them for the benefit of the present and future generations,” Matawalle said.

Going by the PAGMI arrangement, it is expected that the CBN will purchase gold from the ‘gold reserve’ of the Zamfara State government.

The Federal Government had banned mining activities in Zamfara after illegal mining by artisanal miners was linked to the banditry in the state. But Zamfara State Commissioner for Finance, Rabiu Garba, while shedding further light on the ‘gold reserve’, noted that “When the ban is lifted and mining activities resume fully, we (Zamfara State government) are hopeful that we will be receiving royalties from miners while the Federal Government will also be giving us something”.

READ MORE: https://www.icirnigeria.org/how-zamfara-gold-mining-ressurected-clamour-for-resource-control-by-oil-producing-states/

Zoo

Nigeria my country

So we should remain as mumu and be watching while our oil resources are drilled and shared equally to all, only for others to mine their gold and keep the proceeds.

Is that not the height of wickedness?!

Southern Governors since 1999 have always been greedy Mofos

None of this is new

They kept quiet during OBJ and GEJ cos they were getting enough money from oil

Am sooo glad with the way Nigeria is now

It will teach everyone a hard lesson

in the end, Nigerians will win

sugar coat it the way you like just know we are deceiving our selves

Guys they’re on a mission to conquer the entire Nigeria they’re the masters and we’re the slaves we must not let the 1999 constitution hold any longer

The north and sharia are bent on a conquest to take and control Nigeria

Their agenda is clearer now