“We’ve been waiting three years for this,” says Donald Burton, Etruscan’s vice-president of exploration. “It fits very well with everything we’re doing at Samira.”
Of the US$6.75 million, US$4 million will be paid in cash and US$2.75 million will be paid by issuing convertible debentures. The latter will have a 36-month term with interest set at the London Inter Bank Offer Rate plus 2%. Ashanti and Iamgold can redeem their debentures for cash or shares at any time after 18 months.
The key asset on the 709-sq.-km Saoura permit is the Libiri gold deposit, which is in the permit’s northwestern corner, only 3 km from Samira Hill.
Using a 1-gram cutoff grade at Libiri, Ashanti and Iamgold have reported a 5.3-million-tonne resource grading 2.2 grams gold per tonne (or 370,000 contained ounces), whereas at a 0.5-gram cutoff, the resource is 9.4 million tonnes of 1.6 grams gold (480,000 contained ounces). The Libiri zone has been traced over a 5-km strike length with drill spacing of 100-125 metres.
Overall at Saoura, the partners carried out 2,338 metres of diamond drilling, 18,477 metres of reverse-circulation drilling and 12,000 metres of rapid-air-blast drilling.
The agreement is subject to a 120-day due diligence period that will include confirmation drilling of the Libiri deposit.
Once the Saoura deal is closed, Etruscan can begin its own infill drilling campaign at Libiri, possibly before the rainy season in June. “We’re quite anxious to get in there and do more drilling because we think it’s going to be even bigger than Samira,” says Burton. “The most important thing is that the two deposits are on the same stratigraphic horizon, and that’s what has always excited us about being in this part of the Birimian.”
He notes that Etruscan will also follow up on 20,000 metres of exploration drilling carried out elsewhere by the partners on the Saoura permit. That work identified two new zones and resulted in one 24-metre intercept grading 4.4 grams gold.
Meanwhile, at the Samira Hill project, a feasibility study is scheduled to be completed in early April.
Burton says the Saoura acquisition will not have an immediate impact on the feasibility study because the company has committed to fast-tracking production at the stand-alone Samira Hill project.
However, the 3,000-tonne-per-day mill that Etruscan has envisioned building at Samira Hill has been designed to allow its daily capacity to be boosted to 5,000 tonnes.
“We view Niger as the company-maker for Etruscan,” says Burton. “We’ve been patient, we’ve done a good job with government and business in Niger over the past four or five years, and I think it’s just starting to pay off in terms of expansion.”
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