CGA completes maiden resource on Segilola in Nigeria

CGA Mining (CGA-T, CGX-A) hopes to develop the first gold mine in Nigeria — a country it describes as having “outstanding rocks and geology” but “no hard rock mining industry”. If the company is successful, it will be the third time its management team has developed a country’s first major gold mine.

CGA developed Gold Pride, a gold mine in Tanzania, about 750 km northwest of Dar es Salaam and 200 km south of Lake Victoria that still underpins Resolute Mining‘s (RSG-A) production profile, according to Michael Carrick, CGA’s president and chief executive, and the Boroo gold project in Mongolia, 110 km northwest of Ulaanbaatar, which it sold to Centerra Gold (CG-T, CAGDF-O).

Segilola is a high-grade deposit in Osun state, 120 km northeast of Lagos, Nigeria’s principal port and commercial center, and 18 km south of Ilesha, the local government centre. (Ilesha is on the main road between Lagos and Abuja, the state capital.)

Carrick says he believes CGA will be amenable to open-pit mining methods and estimates cash costs will fall below the US$200 per oz. level.

According to its maiden resource, Segilola has a resource of 620,000 ounces of gold based on first-pass drilling of 12,166 metres in 119 holes with depths ranging from 40 metres to 220 metres.

In the indicated category Segilola has an estimated resource of 3.66 million tonnes grading 4.4 grams gold per tonne for contained gold of 522,000 oz. In the inferred category, Segilola has 790,000 tonnes grading 3.8 grams gold for 97,600 oz. gold.

The deposit remains open along an existing strike length of 1.9 km and at depth.

CGA is planning follow-up drilling and has already kicked off a feasibility study.

Past drill results include 105.1 grams gold over 4 metres; 19.1 grams gold over 6 metres; 22.5 grams gold over 4.5 metres; 42.5 grams gold over 3 metres; 25.1 grams gold over 5.7 metres and 34.6 grams gold over 4.6 metres.

The project area is in the crystalline basement complex rocks of Southwestern Nigeria within the Ilesha schist belt. Schist belts in Nigeria present as north-south trending domains of Upper Proterozoic meta-sedimentary, meta-volcanic and intrusive sequences that are oriented parallel to the boundary between the West African Craton and the Pan African province (similar to the Ashanti and Sefwi belts in Ghana).

Gold commonly occurs as either very fine disseminations or as coarser, often visible, grains in the altered gneissic host rock and in quartz-feldspar veins.

In addition to Segilola, CGA owns the Masbate gold project in the Philippines, where gold was first poured on May 12. In October, CGA reported production at Masbate reached a record 14,061 ounces of gold in the month of September, with cash operating costs before taxes of US$437 per oz.

At presstime in Toronto CGA was trading at $2.16 per share and over the last year the company has traded in a 70¢ -$2.32 per share range.

CGA has 269.2 million shares outstanding.