By Lateef Taiwo, Abuja

The director general of the Nigerian Mining Cadastral Office, NMCO, Engr Obadiah Simon Nkom, has stated that the agency’s Internally Generated Revenue, IGR, has continued to witness increase on a yearly basis since 2019 despite the challenges associated with the COVID-19 pandemic, funding among others faced.

He stated this during his acceptance speech after he was conferred with ‘Outstanding Leadership Award, OLA, by the National Association of Nigerian Students, NANS, on Wednesday in his office at the MCO headquarters in Abuja.

According to him, the transparency and accountability upheld in pursuit of the organisation’s mandate were responsible for the revenue maximisation, adding that since 2019 when he came on board and up till now that he is serving second term following his reappointment in January, the agency had surpassed the previous year in generated revenue.

He said: “When you look at our revenue since 2019, we have always surpassed the previous year. During the COVID-19 in 2020, we supposed to have shut down, but we still surpassed the previous year, even as I speak today even though we are in the middle of the year, we have surpassed last year’s revenue.

“It simply means that if at the end of June, we are already surpassing last year, then whatever it is, we’re meeting the target; we need this Internally Generated Revenue, IGR.”

Engr Nkom expressed deep appreciation to the leadership of NANS for the recognition and honour done to him based on their assessment of his leadership and the value it added to the growth and development of the sector and the economy in general through his stewardship at the MCO.

According to him, it had only come to encourage him to work harder towards taking the office’s contribution to sectorial and national development to a higher level.

He also noted that the effort of the office under his watch to upgrade technologically and digitally had begun to pay off, and recalled that the MCO emerged the best digital innovation agency of the federal government for 2022 by NIRA, a Non- governmental body established to manage the Nigeria’s country code, which presented the award to the best portal of the federal government with excellent user experience that promote innovation and local content development with the .ng domain name.

Noting that developing Nigeria is a responsibility that all and sundry must take, he said upon assuming office as the DG, the mandate to uphold transparency, accountability, and revenue maximisation was clearly established and being followed to the latter under his watch.

Expressing the readiness of his office to partner NANS in undertaking the responsibility of developing Nigeria, the number one mineral titles administrator in the country noted that the solid minerals constitute a large percentage of the wealth of nations hence the essence of developing the mining sector is to create more jobs for the well-being of citizens in the country, especially for the youths.

He hailed the President Bola Ahmed Tinubu administration for showing concerns on the plights and well-being of the Nigerian students. Recall that President signed the students loan bill signed into law recently.

Speaking earlier, the National Secretary of NANS, Usman Baba Kaikai, the national EXCO of NANS, because of the importance they attach to the visit, mobilised to attend from far and near, they were on ground to affirm their support for the contributions of the Nkom-led MCO to the development of the mining sector and the economy of the country at large, hailing the positive impact of his leadership style on the day-to-day operations of the office, and most importantly how the system had been sanitised with transparency and accountability.

Speaking further, he said the award is “to encourage you to continue to do more because you’re doing it in the interest of the growth and wellbeing of all Nigerians. As such we’re proud to associate with your stewardship.