TORONTO (miningweekly.com) – South Africa's Department of Minerals and Energy (DME) has confirmed that, should Impala Platinum's planned acquisition of Mvelaphanda Resources and Northam Platinum go ahead, the deal will not affect black economic-empowerment (BEE) credits awarded to Anglo Platinum as a result of its sale of the Booysendal platinum project to Northam.

One of the conditions to the Implats/Mvela/Northam deal, announced on October 2, was that the empowerment credits that Angloplat received as a result of the Booysendal transaction would not be affected.

“The DME has reviewed the proposed transaction and confirmed that the implementation of the proposed transaction will not affect the BEE credits which have accrued to Anglo Platinum,” the companies said in a stock exchange announcement on Monday.

Earlier this month, Implats announced plans to buy South Africa's Mvelaphanda Resources and platinum-miner Northam for about R21,2-billion (around $2,5-billion) in cash and shares, to create a new platinum giant.

Implats wants to get its hands on Northam's lucrative Booysendal project, which the smaller firm bought, with black-owned Mvela's help, earlier this year, from Angloplat. Mvela owns 63% of Northam.

However, Angloplat only agreed to part with the Booysendal project in order to satisfy South Africa's BEE requirements, to ensure that its 'old-order' mining rights in the country were converted to 'new-order' rights.

As a result, the proposed acquisition of Mvela and Northam by Implats has been criticised from some quarters, as undermining the empowerment of black people, which the sale of the Booysendal project to the black-owned Mvela and Northam was meant to achieve.

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