Georgian Mining Corporation (LON:GEO) has today announced that Dr Neil O’Brien, previously Non-Executive Director of the Company, has been appointed Non-Executive Chairman and Michael Struthers, previously Chief Operating Officer, has been appointed Chief Executive Officer with immediate effect.
Mr. Struthers has over 37 years of international operational mining experience and replaces Mr Greg Kuenzel, who has been appointed Finance Director of the Company.
Dr Neil O’Brien brings over 30 years of industry experience to GEO, including 15 years in technical and management roles with Teck Cominco and 13 years of executive management experience with Lundin Mining, as well as extensive board experience in both public and private junior resource industry companies.
These Board changes follow the recent agreement between GEO and its partner, Caucasian Mining Group (‘CMG’), regarding the joint funding of the 2018 work programme (see announcement of 15 March 2018 for further details).
The 2018 work programme focuses on the remaining work required to make a production decision on the Gold Zone 2 (‘GZ2’) oxide gold resource at at Kvemo Bolnisi East (‘KBE’). In addition to an infill drilling programme and related technical studies at KBE, the work programme includes further regional exploration drilling. This is in line with the Company’s objective of exploring and developing other epithermal gold-copper targets within the large licence area. A high priority is also the continued advancement of the KBE copper-gold sulphide Resource, which is currently open to expansion, and which has the geological potential to form one large epithermal copper gold system at depth. The work programme is fully funded and divided equally between GEO and CMG,
In parallel with the feasibility study, and subject to metallurgical testwork results, GEO and RMG Gold LLC (‘RMG’), CMG’s sister production company, will work to finalise a definitive agreement covering the mining and processing of oxide ore from GZ2 at KBE at RMG’s processing facilities at the nearby Madneuli mine, based upon the recently signed Mining MOU. The infill drilling programme is due to commence in April 2018 and the results will be incorporated into a final JORC compliant Resource estimate for the gold oxides at GZ2, along with an update to the copper-gold sulphide Resource. To date, JORC resources at KBE stand at 2.29Mt @ 0.85g/t Au for the gold oxides and 3.154Mt @ 0.82% Cu & 0.14g/t Au for the copper sulphides.
As detailed in the announcement of 21 December 2017, Mr Struthers has a proven track record in project development and management having worked as a project manager with leading global mining companies such as Lundin Mining Corporation, and on mines at various stages of development including feasibility, construction and mine expansion phases. With such a proven technical background, the Board believes Mr Struthers is ideally positioned to deliver the Company’s objectives: firstly to advance the technical and financial studies at KBE in order to finalise the production sharing agreement with RMG, and ready the asset for production; and secondly to develop the full mineral potential for both the wider KB Project and the remainder of the JV license area.
Georgian Mining Corp CEO, Mike Struthers, said: “This is a pivotal period for the Company as we look to realise the value of our first resource development project at KBE, whilst building up a robust pipeline of other projects with our JV partner. In addition to the oxides at KBE we believe the sulphide resources below represent significant value, and we will maintain our focus on further defining this potential along with continued testing of the other well-defined epithermal gold-copper targets across the JV licence area. I originally joined GEO as Chief Operating Officer on the strength of the epithermal geological model, the mineral potential waiting to be developed on the JV license and my confidence in the GEO team. As CEO, I look forward to completing this work and establishing KB and the surrounding areas as yet another world class asset on the prolific Tethyan Belt.”
Georgian Mining Corp Non-executive Chairman, Dr Neil O’Brien, said: “I would like to take this opportunity to thank Greg for the significant contributions he has made as Managing Director to GEO over the years, including the Company’s entry into Georgia through the current Bolnisi JV Project which has the potential to be a company-making asset. With Mike now as CEO, together with the considerable experience of board members Peter Damouni and Laurie Mutch, I believe we have the ideal core team in place to first realise the value of KBE in collaboration with our JV partner, and then grasp the potential for a significant new discovery within the large JV licence area, and in the process generate significant value for GEO’s shareholders.”
