The Health of Mother Earth Foundation (HOMEF) has expressed scepticism on the Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) signed between the Federal Government of Nigeria and the United States on September 23, 2026 to boost American investment in Nigeria’s estimated $700 billion mining sector.
HOMEF warned that that MoU may inadvertently accelerate a cycle of extractivism that prioritises global supply chain security over the rights and well-being of Nigerian communities.
Nigeria’s Solid Minerals Minister, Dele Alake, and US Deputy Secretary of State, Christopher Landau, signed the agreement on the sidelines of the United Nations General Assembly, with claims that it would diversify Nigeria’s economy away from oil and secure critical mineral supply chains for the US.
While the government frames this partnership as a pathway to economic diversification, HOMEF noted that the extraction of critical minerals, particularly lithium, can be an environmentally destructive enterprise.
It also noted that it poses an existential threat of irreversibly depleting and contaminating local water tables, poisoning agricultural land, and disrupting agrarian livelihoods.
HOMEF particularly stated that the extraction of critical minerals, particularly lithium, can be an environmentally destructive enterprise as it poses an existential threat of irreversibly depleting and contaminating local water tables, poisoning agricultural land, and disrupting agrarian livelihoods.
HOMEF in a statement stressed that this trajectory leaves host communities to bear the long-term toxic liabilities of extraction without equitable benefit.
It further said; “There is a structural risk that the rush to satisfy foreign capital will incentivise the government to fast-track mineral title approvals by circumventing robust Social and Environmental Impact Assessments (EIAs) and compromising the integrity of Community Development Agreements (CDAs) mandated under Section 116 of 2027.
“Such shortcuts would fundamentally undermine the legal and social protections designed to safeguard affected populations,” it stated.
While commenting on the development, Executive Director of HOMEF, Dr Nnimmo Bassey, warned that this economic model replicates the Niger Delta’s devastating history.
In the words of Bassey; “We must not reproduce that environmental genocide by replacing oil with minerals while sacrificing lives, lands, and ecosystems.
“This agreement, while cloaked in the language of economic growth, threatens to entrench the same pattern of extractivism that has devastated the Niger Delta for decades. We have seen how international mining interests operate when oversight is weak, and profit is the sole motivation.
“Without stringent safeguards, this MoU risks turning our mineral wealth into a resource curse, leaving behind degraded landscapes and impoverished communities rather than sustainable development,” he stressed.
Bassey further cited the recent tragic deaths of 37 young miners in Niger State custody as an indictment of Nigeria’s punitive, extractive economy, one that criminalises vulnerable citizens driven into hazardous artisanal mining by systemic poverty.
According to him; “We are deeply concerned that the rush to feed global demand for critical minerals will be prioritised over the livelihoods, health, and sovereignty of Nigerian communities.
“Strategic vigilance is required to ensure that our minerals serve our own development needs first, and that the rights of local people are protected against land dispossession and pollution,” he enthused.
HOMEF highlighted that the global demand for critical minerals such as lithium, cobalt, nickel, and copper often drive rapid industrial expansion that ignores the ecological integrity of host regions that have suffered ecological disaster.
It noted that DRC is one such example where millions of citizens have been displaced and are now refugees due to the push for so-called critical minerals.
HOMEF further said that beyond the Democratic Republic of Congo, where industrial mines have flattened entire communities and fueled geopolitical conflict resulting in millions of internally displaced persons, several other notable examples highlight the severe ecological and human costs of fast-tracked mining.
It therefore called on the Federal Government to provide the public and civil society with the full details of the MoU, moving beyond high-level announcements to clarify the specific environmental, labour, and fiscal obligations involved and to remember that Nigeria’s long-term prosperity lies in the preservation of its ecosystems and the empowerment of its people, not in becoming a primary resource repository for foreign industrial powers
HOMEF also called on all stakeholders to remain vigilant and to demand that any mineral development framework prioritise the well-being of Nigerian communities and the preservation of the nation’s natural heritage.
While advising host communities, Civil Society Organisations (CSOs), and relevant stakeholders to approach the agreement with heightened scrutiny, it urged them to focus on four critical areas of vulnerability that require immediate attention.
