The Federal Ministry of Mines and Steel Development has discovered gold deposits along the Abuja, Nasarawa axis through the National Integrated Mineral Exploration Project.
The Minister of Mines and Steel Development, Olamilekan Adegbite, stated this in Abuja while hosting the Governor Abdullahi Sule of Nasarawa State.
According to a statement issued in Abuja by his media aide, Ayodeji Adeyemi, the minister assured his guest that the FMMSD would develop the mineral resources in Nasarawa.
He noted that his ministry had resolved to avoid a repeat of the scenario in Zamfara (where bandits were mainly in charge of the gold mining) in Nasarawa State.
He added that the NIMEP project, which had cost the ministry N15bn, generated many geoscience data that got foreign investors excited about the mining prospects across the country.
The Minister said, “Nasarawa State is the home of solid minerals in the country. We had an earlier discussion about the recent discovery of precious minerals in the Nasarawa, Abuja axis.
“As you might be aware, we have been talking about this for a while. There is a programme we call NIMEP, executed by the ministry where the government has put about N15bn into exploration for minerals, one of which is gold.
“We have done this exploration across the country and we have discovered a very nice track of gold deposits, especially between Abuja and Nasarawa, where we share borders.”
In his address, Governor Sule assured the minister that his state was prepared to work with the ministry to prevent the snowballing of illegal mining in Nasarawa.
He noted that despite experiencing some form of illegal mining of gold in the area called Ukai, the area had attracted some notable companies who were mining legally in the state.