The Executive Governor of Zamfara state, Bello Matawalle has disclosed that foreigners are buying gold and other mineral resources with arms in Zamfara state.
The Governor disclosed this after presenting some gold bars and other precious stones that were mined in Zamfara State to President Muhammadu Buhari. While making the disclosure, the Governor said his administration chose to embrace the Presidential Artisanal Gold Mining Development Initiative to halt the criminal act being perpetrated by illegal miners in the state.
Matawalle said: “It’s very important to us as a government, particularly, the issue of insecurity, to know the root cause of insecurity. Zamfara state is blessed with many minerals resources and some people outside the country come in to buy gold and other precious stones and sometimes instead of paying people, they pay back with arms. I did some investigations. So, the state government will be buying some of these minerals so that we can block that chain. So, now the state government is engaging the miners. We’ll be buying some of this gold from them with the limited resources we have.”
While talking about the security situation in his state, Matawalle expressed his disagreement with call for sack of service chiefs who according to him need the backing of every stakeholder.
He said: “The narration has changed. You won’t be hearing of mass killings in the state because the security agencies are doing their best. I equally advised the president that those that are calling for the sack of the service chiefs is not the solution. Let’s support the security, we as the governors, we have a big role to play. We just have to support the security agencies.
“If the governors are not serious, they can’t be able to achieve what they want. I advised the president that all those calling for the sack of the security chiefs, they should think of the best way to support them to perform better instead of sacking them, even if you sack them, you’re bringing another one. So, let us use the one that we have. We’ll support them as a government.
“My state now is at peace and everybody is aware. We’ve more than 3000 policemen going round the mining sites in order to protect the mining site. We’ve the security. It’s just for us as leaders to support them. I believe we’ll see a lot of changes in terms of security in this country.”
