Tinubu Govt Launches New Security Outfit To Tackle Illegal Mining

The Bola Tinubu-led Federal Government has commissioned the Mines Marshals, a paramilitary squad.

The Minister of Solid Minerals Development, Dele Alake, launched the Marshals at an event in Abuja on Thursday.

Alake said the squad was formed from a unit of the Nigerian Security and Civil Defense Corps (NSCDC) to tackle the menace of illegal mining in the country.

The minister added that the unit, which consists of 2,220operatives, would also curb the smuggling of solid minerals from the country to foreign nations.

Alake also charged the new operatives to stem theft and all nefarious activities around the nation’s mineral resources to enable the nation to reap maximum benefits from its God-given resources.

He said with a command structure spread across the 36 states and the FCT, the mining marshals will have their command and control domiciled in the Ministry of Solid Minerals Development, with  60 operatives first deployed in each state of the federation and the FCT.

According to him, the official reception of the marshals will ensure security at mining sites, eliminate illegality, and sanitise mining environments to counter illegal mining and smuggling of solid minerals from Nigeria. He described this as a major success in his seven-point agenda.

He added that the mining marshals devised to be an inter-agency security outfit will incorporate special operatives from other security agencies like the Nigeria Police, army, amongst others

He said: said, “Insecurity has bedevilled the mineral sector of this economy and it has combined with other variables to short-change revenue generation. So amongst others, the issue of combating insecurity in this sector is very crucial if we are going to record any success. Without the security of the operating environment in the mineral sector, you can’t even talk of increasing the revenue yield. We hope and believe that the minerals will become the revenue saver of the Nigerian economy and we are pursuing the goal of making the mineral sector contribute more than 50 per cent to the gross domestic product and that is our long-term objective.

“Today’s event of launching and formally handing over the civil defence structure to engage illegal miners and sanitise our mining environment was also part of what we conceived at the inter-ministerial committee. I am very happy to let the public know that we did say at the onset that we are going to tackle insecurity and the first batch of the security apparatus that we are using in this sector is what we are launching here today. The civil defence structure already existed before and we thought that amongst other logistic support that are necessary for the takeoff of the new security architecture for this sector.

“And then in terms of the numbers, we are starting initially with 60 personnel per command. But that is just for the takeoff phase. I have also mentioned that other security agencies will come on board very soon. So the number is going to keep increasing as the need arises. But because we needed to fast track the execution of this policy that’s why this civil defence structure had to be used to execute the mines marshals.”

In his remarks, NSCDC Commandant-General, Abubakar Audi, stated that the new mining marshals would give verve to the corps’ mandate of protecting national assets and infrastructure in which solid minerals are a major component.