Forget Niger Delta's Oil, Ile Ife's Gold Can Sustain Nigeria - Ooni Of Ife

 

The Ooni of Ife, Oba Adeyeye Ogunwusi, says Ile Ife will be the take-off point of the new Nigerian economy in a post oil and gas era.

Said Oba Ogunwusi:

“All over the country solid minerals are everywhere. But we haven’t even exploited it.

“Indeed, we can survive without oil and gas. If we don’t have oil and gas, we can survive because the mysteries in this land are more than anywhere in the world.

“There is a huge potential in Ife. There is no solid mineral we don’t have. We have gold, Timberlight Gemstone… We have very large scale deposit of all those materials and I like to practice what I preach.”
“The beads that I am wearing, I went as far as Benin Kingdom to go an exploit the beads. People don’t wear it any longer but it is made in Nigeria and I am proud to say it. The gold in between it, I took it from Mokuru waters in Ife and it is one of the most purified gold in the world. It is a 23.9 karat gold, raw. We just decided to do surface mining.
“We have it in Nigeria. We have it in Ife, Ilesa and in Niger State. All these things are just littered everywhere. But there is nobody to harness and put all those structures in place.
“We have focused too much on oil and gas.