Last year the Nigerian government announced that it would no longer tolerate rampant illegal mining and would begin enforcement actions to crack down on the practice. To make sure that everyone knew how serious they were, the Federal Government set up special courts just to prosecute illegal mining cases and then the states deployed heavily armed patrols to go into remote areas to apprehend offenders.

Dozens of Chinese nationals were arrested in a number of raids this spring, mostly in southwestern Osun state.

In addition to curtailing illegal mining activities, the Federal Government is also going after Chinese companies that violate environmental regulations. Authorities took action against the Hongao Mining Company that ran a gold mine near the capital Abuja for polluting the local water table.

Officials were tipped off to Hongao's misdeeds from an investigative report produced by Chinedu Asadu, a journalist at the Nigerian online news site The Cable. Chinedu joins Eric & Cobus to discuss the Hongao case and the government's broader efforts to rein in illegal Chinese gold mining.

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