By MARTHA AGAS

Architype Industries Nigeria Ltd. has described the demands of the Itasa community in Iwajowa Local Government Area of Oyo State as unrealistic and outside the scope of its Community Development Agreement (CDA).

The Managing Director of the company, Adeniran Ajibade, told the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) on Sunday in Abuja that the company was not opposed to a review of its CDA as requested by the community.

NAN recalls that leaders and youths of Itasa staged a protest in March over the alleged exploration and exploitation of its natural resources by Architype Industries Nigeria Ltd.

They accused the mining company of breaching the CDA that provided for adequate compensation and environmental rehabilitation, and called for government intervention to address the situation.

Reacting to the allegation, Ajibade said that the community, through its counsel, Femi Aborisade, produced a draft for the review of its CDA, demanding a 30 per cent share of the minerals from the company, among others, which he declined to sign.

“Aborisade said that the company’s operations will remain illegal if the demands are not met.

“Many of the covenants in that particular draft CDA were not in compliance with extant laws, and did not follow the procedures of CDA as launched by the Ministry of Solid Minerals Development.”

He decried the provision where the counsel asked that the community would be sharing 30 per cent of minerals with the company.

“They also mandated that the company would have to tar 70km of roads, all the road network in the town and link the town with surrounding communities.

“They talked about a lot of infrastructural development in terms of looking at the community health centre, palace, town hall and ultra-modern shopping mall,” he said.

According to Ajibade, during a recent meeting with the community facilitated by the Mines Department in Ibadan, the community was informed that its demands were unrealistic and illegal.

“I think the demands are actually grandstanding.

“The counsel wants to introduce four projects to the CDA and wants to stop the business that will generate the resources to implement the projects,” he said.

Ajibade said that although the company had been present in the community for about 25 years, actual mining began only recently, as they had spent years on exploration until their recent breakthrough in discovering lithium ore.

“It is not at this point that they will now be thinking of replacing us with foreigners,” he said.

The managing director said that in a fortnight the company would meet with the community in the Mines Office to resolve all the contention in the draft CDA.

He said that the meeting would be followed by a marathon negotiation in the interest of both parties.

“We agreed that it is in our interest to come together so that we can have peaceful possession of our site,” Ajibade said. (NAN)