The Minister of Solid Minerals Development, Dele Alake, has revoked 1,263 mineral licenses belonging to operators who failed to pay mandatory annual service fees.

The revocation, based on the recommendation of the Mining Cadastral Office (MCO), was announced in a statement by the minister’s special assistant on media, Segun Tomori, in Abuja on Sunday.

The affected titles include 584 exploration licenses, 65 mining leases, 144 quarry licenses, and 470 small-scale mining leases.

Alake explained that the move was aimed at sanitising the sector by eliminating speculators and unserious investors while creating fresh opportunities for committed players.

Warning that the revocation does not mean that the government has pardoned the defaulters, the Minister said that the list of offenders would be forwarded to the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) for recovery.

In the recommendation to the minister, the Director-General of the MCO, Simon Nkom, disclosed that there were 1,957 initial defaulters when his agency published the intention to revoke licences in the Federal Government Gazette on June 19, 2025.