Northern elders chide elites over silence on Lagos gold refinery
The Northern Elders Forum (NEF) has criticised Northern political leaders and elites for remaining silent over the Federal Government’s decision to site Nigeria’s national gold refinery in Lagos State, insisting that the region is demanding constitutional fairness, not favouritism. In a statement on Thursday and signed by its spokesperson, Professor Abubakar Jika Jiddere, the Forum […]
Minister of Solid Minerals Development, Dele Alake, presenting the gold bar document to President Bola Tinubu at the State House, Abuja recently. With them is the Executive Secretary, Solid Minerals Development Fund, Mrs Fatimah Shinkafi.
The Northern Elders Forum (NEF) has criticised Northern political leaders and elites for remaining silent over the Federal Government’s decision to site Nigeria’s national gold refinery in Lagos State, insisting that the region is demanding constitutional fairness, not favouritism.
In a statement on Thursday and signed by its spokesperson, Professor Abubakar Jika Jiddere, the Forum said locating the refinery outside Nigeria’s major gold-producing areas in the North is neither an oversight nor a policy error, but a deliberate decision with serious economic and security consequences.
NEF accused the Federal Government of stripping Northern communities of value addition while concentrating industrial benefits in Lagos and its environs.
The Forum said the move reinforces an extractive economic model in which raw materials are sourced from the North, while processing, branding, financing and industrial infrastructure are located elsewhere.
The Forum cited Sections 14(3) and 16 of the Constitution, which provide for the federal character principle and mandate the state to manage the economy based on social justice and equality of opportunity, arguing that the decision violates both provisions.
Jiddere described the siting of the refinery as “a deliberate act of economic dispossession,” warning that it condemns source communities to poverty, unemployment and insecurity. He said removing value-added industries from resource zones mirrors colonial economic patterns and amounts to “internal colonialism.”
According to NEF, Northern Nigeria has for decades been reduced to a “triple extraction zone” — supplying raw minerals, agricultural produce and cheap labour — while processing and industrialisation are consistently sited elsewhere. It noted that grains, livestock, cotton, hides and skins leave the North in raw form and return as finished goods priced beyond the reach of local producers.
The Forum warned that denying the region industrial anchors deepens youth despair, accelerates rural decline and fuels banditry, kidnapping and mass poverty. It also accused Northern elites of cowardice, questioning the silence of governors, legislators, ministers and traditional leaders.
The Federal Ministry of Solid Minerals Development had dismissed NEF’s claim that the federal government is planning to site a gold refinery in Lagos, describing the allegation as misleading.
Segun Tomori, the Special Assistant on Media to the Minister of Solid Minerals Development, faulted the position of the Northern elders, insisting that the federal government neither owns nor established any gold refinery in Lagos.
Tomori clarified that the Minister of Solid Minerals Development, Dele Alake, never announced the establishment of a government-owned gold refinery in Lagos or anywhere else in the country.
He further explained that the minister had clearly stated that several other gold refineries are in development across the country, all of which are privately owned by different investors.