By: Maazi Obinna Agommuo
Executive Director, ESGADIA.
Below is an excerpt from Wikipedia which I personally would fault.
”Africa is home to some 30 per cent of the world’s mineral reserves, 8 per cent of the world’s natural gas, 12 per cent of the world’s oil reserves; the continent has 40 per cent of the world’s gold and up to 90 per cent of its chromium and platinum.”
As Africans, we must begin to see things differently and to recognize deliberate moves by the West to undermine the size of our Natural Resources.
Looking at the African Map of her Natural Resources below as published by the West mainstream media; Aljazeera, you will realized that Nigeria for example is ascribed to have only Petroleum as her resource, whereas Nigeria is awash with various minerals from North to South and from East to West of the Country, some are being discovered even as we read this article, and this is same with other nations of Africa. One might ask, What’s their motive of the west to want to undermine the size of the natural resources in Africa? am yet to figure it out.
Like I had written in the past, the Governments across Africa need to engage Consultants to put monetary value on all the Mines so far discovered in Africa, that way Africans Africans will know the worth of their resources in monetary terms. This will in no small measure boost the value of our various Nations Sovereignty.
One may ask, What is Nigeria or South Africa worth in terms of Natural Resources?
Democratic Republic of Kongo (DRC) is estimated to worth 37 Trillion Dollars in terms of Natural Resources. How did they arrive at this number, who carried out the survey? I believe that DRC is worth much more than that.
Nigeria for example has various Minerals of commercial value in all the 36 states and Federal Capital Territory (FCT), with Kogi and Nasarawa State topping the list. why is this not prominent in both the electronic and print media of the West? African leaders must help to change this narrative by putting monetary value on our natural resources.
I am also advocating for a collaboration between Ministries of Education and Ministries of Solid minerals, Mines or Natural Resources as the case may be in Africa to introduce Mineral Education that will help educate our children to be properly informed of the Natural resources in their various Nations. Our Children should be made to visit Mining sites, be shown various Mines and be lectured on their various industrial applications.
We have allowed the West to rewrite our history and miseducated us for too long, this has to stop going forward. Our Children don’t have to study Mining, Geology and their likes in the higher Institute to know the different types of Mines in the country and their applications. This is a big failure on the part of the Governments in Africa.
African Governments can start the initiative of catching our children young in the area of Mineral Education.
I am therefore calling on the Ministries responsible for our Natural Resources in Africa to reach out to their counterparts in the Ministry of Education in their various nations to introduce mineral education in the continent. I am also using this window to call on the leadership of the African Union(A.U) to advocate for member states to introduce mineral education in their various states. I am saying this because we are loosing so much as a continent due to lack of education in the mineral sector and sub-sector of the African economy.
I have also noticed that over the Years, Africans are prominent in very limited areas and this is so because we are not fully informed of other areas of abounding opportunities. In Nigeria for example, citizens are prominent in the areas of Oil & Gas and Agriculture, abandoning other solid mineral resources as though they are mere monuments that must be kept sacred, we need to change this mindset. This is why this call is important at this point in time. Our Children needs to be properly educated and be duly informed of the natural resources around them.
An African proverb says.. “That which you overlook becomes that what your mates outsmart you with.”
Looking at the Nigerian state on the African map for example, Petroleum is highlighted as the only natural resource of the Nigerian economy, but this is misleading for both our children and even to investors who may wish to invest in other areas of the of the economy. What happened to the over 37 mineral deposits in Kogi State alone which includes Gold, Iron Ore, Coal, Limestone etc? And Nasarawa’s over 27 mineral deposits all of commercial quantities? Why are they not reflected on the Nigerian space and that of other nations of Africa?
In Nigeria, How many of our Children know that apart from Zamfara State, States like Benue, Niger, Sokoto, Adamawa, Taraba and others have Gold in commercial quantity?
The African tragedy is that of blind followership of their colonial masters.
We at ESGADIA must help to redirect the mindset of Africans particularly our younger generation.