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West African Resources pours first gold at Sanbrado
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On Wednesday 18 March West African Resources poured first gold bars weighing 23.9 kg (768 troy oz) at its Sanbrado Gold Project in Burkina Faso. Construction and commissioning activities are complete in all areas and the project has recently passed 3,000,000 hours worked without a lost time incident. The process plant mill throughput is already meeting nameplate capacity. “This is a major milestone for West African Resources and marks the beginning of a new phase in the WAF story,” said executive chairman Richard Hyde. “To successfully transition from an exploration company to a gold producer is without doubt a great achievement for all involved. I would like to thank WAF’s owners’ team and all consultants, contractors and other stakeholders for their hard work and support over the last four years to bring Sanbrado from discovery into production.” Open-pit mining has ramped up mining activities and continues at both the M5 and M1 South pits, with double day/night shifts ongoing. Currently there are 250,000 tonnes of oxide ore on the ROM pad at an average grade of 1.5 g/t gold, which is reconciling well with grade control models. Underground development continues to progress to schedule. The first development crosscut on the 2120 level (300m below surface) has intercepted visible gold north of the mine plan. Some 1,200t of underground ore has been mined and stockpiled ready for processing.
Teranga Gold acquires Senegal assets from Barrick
Teranga Gold Corporation has completed the previously announced acquisition of a 90% interest in the Massawa Gold Project from a wholly-owned subsidiary of Barrick Gold Corporation and its joint venture partner, Compagnie Sénégalaise de Transports Transatlantiques Afrique de l’Ouest SA (“CSTTAO”). The Government of Senegal holds the remaining 10% interest in Massawa.
With the receipt of Massawa’s exploitation license and residual exploration license, as well as formal consent to integrate Massawa into Teranga’s nearby Sabodala mine, all of the closing conditions for the transaction are now satisfied.
“Now that the transaction is complete, we are turning our focus to integrating the high-grade Massawa deposits into our mine plan and leveraging our existing infrastructure at Sabodala,” said Richard Young, President and CEO. “The combination of the two assets results in significant capital and operating synergies and creates a toptier gold complex.”
The transaction is in line with Barrick’s strategy of focusing on tier one assets. Barrick president and chief executive Mark Bristow said Massawa was one of the largest unexploited gold deposits in West Africa and its legacy company Randgold Resources had developed this over a period of years to the point where its value could now be optimally realized
for the benefit of all its stakeholders. “Teranga is best placed to achieve this as it already owns the nearby Sabodala mine and Sabodala’s combination with Massawa is expected to deliver significant synergies. Barrick will participate in the upside of the combined asset through the 11% interest it is acquiring in Teranga through this transaction,” he said. The upfront consideration of $380 million consisted of approximately $300 million in cash and an aggregate of approximately $80 million in Teranga common shares issued to Barrick and CSTTAO.
