Patrick Ugeh
16 October 2007
Abuja — Minister for Mines and Solid Mineral Development, Alhaji Sarafa Ishola, yesterday assured of the Federal Government's determination to address the multifarious challenges in the way of effective exploration and exploitation of solid minerals, especially bitumen and limestone.
Ishola stated this in Abuja, when Ogun State Governor Gbenga Daniel paid him a courtesy visit to seek his intervention to resolve the bottlenecks hampering exploitation of solid minerals, which, he said, was threatening his drive to attract investors to the state.
Daniel also canvassed for Ogun to be included among oil-producing states, because of the level of mineral deposits and presence of the Liquefied Natural Gas project at Olokola. Daniel said "information available to us shows that Ogun State is the largest or one of the largest locations of bitumen. I can confirm to you that we have done a lot of surveys, and from the samples carried out, we have well over 85 per cent of bitumen and limestone is also abundant.
"We have a number of investors who are ready with necessary resources to establish cement industries in Ogun State. But they can no longer proceed because the issue of who owns the limestone through certain authorisation that have come from your ministry, because of the preponderance of technocrats in this ministry," he said.
He therefore urged the minister to look at thisdispassionately and find amicable solutions to it. "We are determined to take the bull by the horn toresolve all these issues surrounding the productionand extraction of bitumen in the country," Isholadeclared. "I have no doubt that before the end of thisyear a stakeholders meeting will be called to resolveall these issues surrounding the problem of bitumen."According to the minister, bitumen, of which Danielsaid Ogun State had the largest deposits, was verydear to the Federal Government.
This was in referenceto the governor's comment: "We have discovered quite anumber of our hidden talents. We have started totackle some of our hidden treasures... Ogun State isclearly home to many many solid minerals. Ogun Stateshould by now be classified as one of the oilproducing states in Nigeria. We are putting everythingin place and by the time we finish our arithmetic,we'll say Q.E.D. And when we bring it for you to lookat, you will give us the necessary approval. We'relucky the location of LNG in Ogun State is takingplace during our tenure. Ishola said: "The bitumen project that you talkedabout is one of the projects that is very dear to us.We plan to get the project on track. The issuance ofexploration and other licences is being criticalltexamined in this ministry to address the challenges.There are bound to be challenges. We have doneinternal self-assessment and we intend to correctwhatever anomalies that have been noticed in thesystem."The Bureau for Public Enterprise (BPE) had in Augustlast year concluded the financial bid on Bitumen Block1 and 2 in Ogun State with Bitumen Block 2 going toCGC Overseas/Sinopec for N2.4 billion ($18.6 million)as the preferred bidder while Gateway-Mase Bitumen (ajoint venture between Mase of Switzerland and OgunState Government), the sole bidder for block 1,offered a paltry $1.78 million. The offer was rejectedby the apex privatisation agency as far below thereserve bid of $13.6 billion by the BPE.
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