Saying sorry is a sign of weakness...
A truck entered the street leading to Ori Oke Igbala Oniwamimo, a Cherubim and Seraphim church in Igbeti, Olorunsogo Local Government area of Oyo State, on April 7. It was loaded with with batches of minerals and covered with tarpaulin. Off the street was another collection centre for powdered lithium stones, and from there, the truck would take off at 9:34 pm.
Lithium-carrying trucks wait until midnight before journeying out of Igbeti, this reporter has learned, after collecting minerals from the different collection points scattered in the ancient town. One is behind New Links College of Health Technology, off Igboho road. Some distance further up, there’s another collection centre, close to a public borehole. Opposite the road leading to Arije Royal Castle Inn, there is another one, and then the one off the street leading to Ori Oke Igbala Oniwamimo. Along Bani road, there are several others sited in front of residential buildings.
At the centre behind the college of health, a Chinese man was spotted moving with a gun-bearing civil security officer. His black 4RUNNER SUV with number plate GWA-666 GW was parked under a tree, while a lavender-colour truck hired to collect the minerals being bagged waited at the centre. His fellow Chinese and illegal mining financier, who was patronising another centre, drove a black Highlander with number plate APP-06 HZ.
These Chinese miners operate freely within the town and are known faces to their collaborators, including tens of young locals who work at collection centres and truck owners.
“They are taking them [lithium ore] overseas,” said Lateef Akanni*, this reporter’s rider. “You know they are from China.”
These minerals, once transported out of the water-starved town, are first taken to different locations in Sagamu, Ogun State, and then Ibadan, the Oyo State capital.
Another Chinese miner in Igbeti
Photo Credit: Sodeeq Atanda/FIJ
A 4RUNNER SUV owned by the smoking Chinese pictured in the opening section of this story at the Centre behind the college New Links College of Health Technology
Photo Credit: Sodeeq Atanda/FIJ.
LIKE IGBETI, LIKE BANI
In Bani, a town in Kwara State’s Kaiama Local Government area, this reporter found a similar situation. Lithium was being traded both secretly and openly. A lithium ore dealer at a community market showed FIJ his store full of bags of the mineral obtained from Daba.
He said that their major clients were Chinese and Malians. Depending on grades, he said, one kilogram was sold for between N170 and N225 but could increase after the last Ramadan fasting.
Some young men at a collection centre at Bani market, Bani
Photo Credit: Sodeeq Atanda/FIJ
Meanwhile, the price of lithium is growing exponentially in the global market due to high demand. China leads the demand pack globally. As of mid-July 2022, according to Business Monitor International (BMI), a provider of insights, data and analytics, a tonne of lithium carbonate and lithium hydroxide traded for between $69,000 and $65,000. Lithium ore is now more coveted globally due to the strategic demand for the production of electronic rechargeable batteries, solar panels and electric vehicles. Nigeria has it in “high grade”, according to Abdulrazaq Garba, the director-general of the Nigerian Geological Survey Agency. However, the country still imports lithium-made materials from countries like China.
No fewer than 15 different types of solid minerals are found in Oyo State alone, but criminal groups are actively competing with the state for them. And the involvement of criminal miners hurts the state beyond just a loss of revenue. On January 16, illegally warehoused dynamites exploded in Old Bodija, a residential area in Ibadan, killing five persons and destroying properties. The owners of the explosives were foreign illegal miners, according to the state government.
The mining sector contributed only 0.33 percent to Nigeria’s gross domestic product (GDP) in 2015. More recently, the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS), Nigeria’s data agency, stated that the mining and quarrying sector contributed 4.47 percent to the GDP in the fourth quarter of 2023, lower than 4.51 percent recorded in the same period in 2022.
The sector is highly blighted by illegal operations. And, according to Emeka Okoro, a security expert with SBM Intelligence, a Lagos State-based firm that researches geopolitical and security issues in Nigeria and West Africa, Nigeria could lose up to $22 billion to illegal miners in a very bad year.
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“Reports suggest it’s a significant problem,” Okoro said. “But estimates range from $2-5 billion annually, with some reports suggesting losses as high as $22 billion (N8 trillion) or $3 billion annually. However, the actual figure could be higher or lower due to unreliable data.”
INTO THE JUNGLE OF DABA
Miners at work in Daba
Photo Credit: Sodeeq Atanda/FIJ
With a combination of some rough clothes and dusty flip-flops, this reporter pretended to be a potential okada rider willing to start lithium haulage business and embarked on a dreadful journey to Daba, a camp inside the Old Oyo National Park, where Chinese money bags facilitate the mining of lithium through armed gangs, some of whom speak Hausa and Fulfulde.
The Chinese miners operate at a distance from Daba. In fact, they dread the mining area so much that they don’t go there for fear of being held hostage by their armed gang partners, according to local sources. Their central role in the operation is to collect the minerals mined through local dealers.
To move the mineral from the camp to Igbeti, the services of Okada riders are required, and it was by pretending to learn the trade of transporting lithium that I penetrated Daba.
At first, it was difficult getting a rider that could introduce this reporter to the trade. Three motorcyclists turned down the request to take me into Daba because “it is a jungle of great risks” and they had chosen to stay away from there.
Eventually, my effort paid off. Akanni, a local with deep knowledge of the secret trade, took the bait and would help me navigate the journey.
We fixed a day to go. My understanding with him was to travel into Daba to see what it looked like and learn how to get customers for myself.
Google map showing the precise location inside the national park indicated with a yellow placemark
Located on Google coordinates 8.59204N,4.03338E, Daba is only accessible by motorcycle, and many grownups in Igbeti have never been there. From Idi-Igba, the journey to Daba would take one and half hours on a narrow pathway with countless contours and bends. According to Akanni, this reporter would need some “protective charm” because of the risks criss-crossing the area.
Two bumpy roads lead to this jungle: Ogundiran and Iyana Ile-Ise Edu. They both cut off from the reddened Isokun-Iseyin highway that streaks from Igbeti to Bani. Along this miles-long stretch of road, there are at least four isolated settlements and various farmlands that had been starved of rains for a while. Some of these settlements are occupied by ethnic groups such as Bororo, Fulani and Zuru.
While there are no formal rules for joining the lithium transportation business, it takes a lot to understand how to operate on these routes. Lithium-loaded motorcycles have the right of way when transporting over-filled 50-kilogram bags to Igbeti township from Daba. This right of way gives a rider, who is delicately navigating the sandy pathway and its many bends. However, it does not guarantee a hitch-free journey.
This reporter found several fully-loaded motorcycles fallen on the way. Under the burden of his load, a young rider veered off the road in my presence. Thinking he needed help to lift his motorcycle and re-fasten the two heavy bags of lithium he was transporting, this reporter told his rider to stop in order to offer the young man some help. But Akanni resisted the move, saying, “There is no mercy on this road.”
“Except you are operating as a group, you are on your own if you have an accident,” Akanni told me.
When our motorcycle had a collision with another and I was quick to say “sorry” to the rider on the other side, Akanni told me, “You don’t say sorry [here].”
“That could be seen by the other party as being unfamiliar with the terrain and being weak,” he explained. “If you start engaging in an exchange of words with him and you are not faster to descend on him, he can bring out his sword and behead you. Nobody will know you have been killed.”
The two riders locked eyes without saying a word. The other man – he had a sword – left after seeing that there was no damage to his motorcycle.
An Okada rider arriving from Daba and waiting to offload bags of powered mineral
Photo Credit: Sodeeq Atanda/FIJ
Mining started in Daba about seven years ago, according to Akanni. In the early days of the camp, internal contradictions between the predominantly non-Yoruba speaking miners and Yoruba okada riders often resulted in snatching of motorcycles and even killings. But that is no longer the case after both groups came to the understanding that violence is unhelpful to their trade. To go into this territory requires not just an understanding of the topography but also the culture of the people who man the routes. There is a loose interconnectivity of pathways that only the transporters know where they lead to. Once a passageway is impassable during rainy seasons, the riders would create a new one to be able to carry on their business.
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In a day, an agile rider could make up to N100,000, an amount higher in many folds than what an average rider transporting human passengers from street to street earn daily in Igbeti. But the mechanical stability of such a motorcycle will be lost in a matter of months. According to Kola Dele (not real name), a Lagos State-based indigene of Igbeti, some people doing this business of transportation have used the money “to do good things”.
People in this trade generally call lithium ore konsa. To transport a well-packed 50-kilogram bag of konsa from the mining centre to Bani would cost between N6,000, but to Igbeti, it would cost N8,000. Per trip, a rider could carry two bags, giving him N16,000. FIJ found that before a consignment could leave Daba, it would be marked with a permanent marker to indicate the identity of the receiving agent and the appropriate collection centre.
Miners at work in Daba.
Photo Credit: Sodeeq Atanda/FIJ
PARK RANGERS HELP RIDERS THRIVE
To be a rider in Daba, it is important to make friends with colleagues in order to have access to important information, including intel from park rangers on a patrol itinery. When rangers patrol, riders don’t work. But the miners in Daba are never affected. This is because the patrol team would not go beyond Baagbori village. Baagbori is only a 30-minute ride to Daba, but it’s a deadly adventure for rangers.
The Old Oyo National Park was created by the National Parks Service Act for the conservation of wildlife and the general ecosystem in 1952, through the merger of the Upper Ogun and Oyo-Ile, previously native administrative forests. Now a protected area, the park is home to stone-age monuments, including the ruins of the political headquarters of the collapsed Old Oyo Empire and some endangered species of animals. Section 3 (1) (d) of the Nigerian Mining and Minerals Act, 2007, prohibits the grant of any mineral title over such an area of land. It also frowns at removing, possessing or disposing of any mineral without a permit as a serious crime and provides for some sanctions against violators.
Gabiel Agba, a conservator of park at the National Park Service (NPS) acknowledged, questions sent via email but refused to give a response. Dele Alake, the minister of solid minerals, too, did not respond to a detailed list of questions sent to him through his known phone number, but he recently launched a mining corps, special security initiative, tasked with combatting illegal mining in the country.
Iziaq Kunle Salako, the minister of state for environment, the service’s supervising ministry, however, told FIJ that the ministry knew of the mining operation. He also said that some people in the communities around the area were responsible for compromising security efforts.
“Some members of the communities have become accomplices in aiding the illegal mining activities as they most often divulge information to miners and this is the reason the National Park Service plans are frequently punctured,” Salako said in response to an emailed request for comment by FIJ.
While the minister also stated that the ministry had “is in synergy with other sister security agencies” to end illegal mining in the park, he did not comment on one of the questions touching on how effective the synergy had been in view of the almost permanency of the armed miners within the park and their Chinese funders.
Riders waiting at a toll gate manned by local hunters and ticketers close to Baagbori
Photo Credit: Sodeeq Atanda/FIJ
INSIDE DABA CAMP
Motorcyclists who operate on the Daba route are made to part with thousands of naira daily in carrying out their trade. Access into the mining centre is strictly controlled and supervised by local hunters and ticketers who mount at least four toll gates at separate intervals in this jungle. Nothing passes by without their notice. While going to Daba, it is not required to pay any money to these protectors. In fact, there are separate passageways for lithium-carrying and empty motorcycles.
At each point, a loaded motorcycle pays between N500 and N1,000. On many occasions, a rider spends between N2,500 and N2,600 settling the local hunters protecting the routes for smooth activities. The most important toll gate is situated at Baagbori village.
Not less than 200 trips happen on these pathways daily. At the rate of N2,500 per trip, these gun-wielding local hunters and unarmed toll collectors would earn N500,000 per day. This figure presents a lucrative opportunity that is unavailable to an average hunter in Igbeti.
The journey to Daba lasted for about one hour and 30 minutes. In the camp , there are several mining areas under different managers and manual workers. As a collective, these miners hold sway on this part of the park. They are in possession of swords, arms and ammunition.
Alighting from the motorcycle, this reporter traversed several metres of the sprawling site and cautiously interacted with miners. This place could accommodate well over 1,000 people. While mining is the major activity, it is being aided by a collection of trading activities. Hundreds of temporary shelters or shanties made of waterproofs and wood provide a resting place for these miners and traders at night. Access to daily supplies is not a problem as dedicated suppliers resident in Igbeti and other communities troop in at different hours of the day to deliver goods to their customers.
A deep mining sinkhole in Daba
Photo Credit: Sodeeq Atanda/FIJ
In this male-dominated illicit trade, there still exists a space for a very few adult women and children. The adult women, probably wives to the miners or villagers from nearby settlements, sell potpourri of foods while some school-age children go on errands for their parents. The business of soft drinks, bread, cigarettes and marijuana is largely in the hands of men. However, these items are understandably more expensive in Daba.
An estimated 300 mining sinkholes have been created in Daba; some were active when this reporter visited and some had been abandoned. Illegal mining activities are common in the country, but the elaborate scale this current scheme has taken in this natural ecosystem makes it unusual. As an exclusive zone, the park should be immune to such an illegal act.
Mining is being done manually. No industrial technology was seen. The sinkholes varied in sizes and depths, but each required a miner to go inside with a rope to be held by someone else on the outer side. The holes were created after miners detonated blasting explosives to break the rocks.
The man on the outside would throw a bucket tied to a rope, and the one inside the hole would fetch lithium into it. They use sledgehammers to break solid ones into smaller sizes. They could blast rock formations at any time of the day to access the minerals beneath them. No health precautions whatsoever.
A mining cluster in Daba
Photo Credit: Sodeeq Atanda/FIJ
In the process of fetching this mineral from the deep undergrounds, a sinkhole could cave in on the miners inside. Sometimes, these holes have bends inside and a miner has to crawl steeply to get to the right spot and spend several hours and moments inside, engulfed by darkness and heat. In the process, these miners inhale dust and breathe in bad air. Continuous exposure to dust in and outside the holes could cause cardiovascular ailments and eye defects, according to the World Health Organisation.
There are several graves in Daba, multiple sources said. Hundreds of miners have died and been buried there because mining sinkholes crumbled on them.
A source said, “As much as they are making money, the place is their graveyard. Many of them have died after mining pits, which were several kilometres deep, crumbled on them. Some died because of internal conflicts at separate times and were all buried in the park.”
ARE ILLEGAL MINERS BANDITS?
FIJ has found a connection between the armed miners and the insecurity plaguing communities in these areas. In fact, these armed gangs in Daba may have been responsible for the reported series of abductions in Igbeti and other Oke-Ogun communities recently.
“Aside from the swords you see hanging on their necks and local guns on their shoulders, they have big guns. Lives mean almost nothing to them. Security officers in our community know this as a fact. They killed two or three park rangers here in 2023. I am not going to dispute the fact they could be kidnappers at the same time,” Akanni said.
Newspaper headlines showing series of abductions around the park
Through a statement by Yakubu Zull, a conservator of parks and special assistant on media to Ibrahim Goni, the conservator-general, published in 2023, FIJ found that Peter Amhagbor, a deputy conservator of parks; and Adedokun Adeola, a chief park inspector, were the rangers killed by miners in August 2023. Zull hinted that the miners “were suspected to be members of armed bandits from Niger and Zamfara”.
Some residents believe that these Chinese are financing insecurity through their operations in the region.
In 2018, some kidnappers emerged from the park and took eight passengers hostage. A resident of Igbeti told The PUNCH that someone had previously been abducted around the same place and released only after a ransom was paid.
Similarly, Akeem Olajide and Gbenga Ojo, two staff members of the West African Examination Council (WAEC), were kidnapped along the Igbeti-Kishi section of the park in the same year. Tribune reported that N10 million was paid to secure their release.
Illegal mining is linked to insecurity in Nigeria. Speaking at the African High-level Meeting on Counter-Terrorism in April, President Bola Tinubu emphasised this fact. “Look at the illegal mining that plagues so many of our nations today. Those who think illegal mining has no connection with financing terrorism are sorely mistaken,” Tinubu said.
The silence of the Chinese authorities on the high level of environmental crimes being committed by some of its nationals in Nigeria raises suspicion as to whether it is backing these operations, according to the SBM security analyst.
“Investigations and evidence are needed to establish direct responsibility, including proof of Chinese government or state-owned entities’ explicit support or complicity,” he said. “Without evidence, international pressure and scrutiny can still encourage China to take a more proactive stance in addressing these issues.”
A mining cluster in Daba
Photo Credit: Sodeeq Atanda/FIJ
‘PAY FINES AND GO’
Several metric tons of lithium ore and other minerals have been confiscated and Chinese illegal miners prosecuted in recent months. Thanks to court orders, a few convicted ones have been asked to pay fines and go. This is despite the fact that the Miscellaneous Offences Act, the law under which the miners were charged, says that anyone who mines unlawfully “shall be guilty of an offence and liable on conviction to be sentenced to imprisonment for life.“
EFCC’s publications on the arrests of Chinese and Nigerians involved in illegal mining in Igbeti and some other areas in Oyo and Kwara State
Between 2022 and March 2024, at least 19 Chinese miners and 50 local collaborators, as well as their vehicles, were arrested between Oyo and Kwara State.
When reached for comment on May 24 about the capacity of the EFCC to question and prosecute these Chinese considering the language barrier, Dele Oyewale, the agency’s spokesperson, said the agency needed interpreters to deal with the challenge like in every case that involves non-English-speaking suspects.
“What we normally do is to employ interpreters. Whenever we have an operation that involves a foreigner who may not understand English, we go out to look for interpreters that would interpret whatever information we have to direct to them. In this particular instance of Chinese, we employ Chinese interpreters to interpret whatever operational issues that are involved,” Oyewale said.
Only three Chinese nationals and one Nigerian have been convicted so far, and none served a jail term. Prosecutors charged Gang Deng, a Chinese, to court, and he was handed a five-year jail term for illegal mining in Kwara State in October 19, 2022. Instead of a spending time in prison, he was given an option N1 million ($703) fine.
On May 15, a court sentenced Xiao Yi, 50; and Duan Ya Hong, 52, to one year imprisonment each over mining offences. In lieu of jail terms, the court ordered them to pay N2 million ($1,406) and N1.5 million ($1,054) as fines. For similar offences, the anti-graft agency also arrested 13 Chinese in July 2023. EFCC said some of these Chinese miners “entered Nigeria with visitor’s visa”, which is valid for non-extendable 90 days.
In March 2023 also, Buba Muhammed, a 37-year-old truck driver, was asked to pay N400,000 or spend one year in prison for unlawful possession of solid minerals. His truck was forfeited to the government.
These fines have not changed Daba from serving as a thriving mineral coast for these illicit actors. This territory remains an alluring shadow for illegal mining operations far away from camera lenses, despite the presence of multifaceted security outfits stationed in Igbeti.
Editor’s Note: Asterisked names have been changed for the sources’ safety.
This story was produced with support from the Wole Soyinka Centre for Investigative Journalism (WSCIJ) under the Collaborative Media Engagement for Development Inclusivity and Accountability project (CMEDIA) funded by the MacArthur Foundation.
