JOHANNESBURG (miningweekly.com) – The late Brett Kebble company, the JSE-listed Randgold & Exploration (R&E), will distribute another R330-million in gold shares and dividends to its long-suffering shareholders, taking the totaldistribution to date to R1,5-billion.

At a general meeting in Johannesburg chaired by acting chairperson Motsehoa Brenda Madumise, shareholders gave 100% support to the distribution of 2,2-million Gold Fields shares at R4 a share and a special dividend of 90c a share.

This is the second distribution since the company was taken over from Kebble, following his controversial demise five years ago.

The first was in July and this agreed distribution will take place on January 14.

The company continues to have R190-million in cash.

“We don’t want the cash to burn a hole into our pockets,” R&E CEO Marais Steyn tells Mining Weekly Online.

Steyn sees the company at a crossroads and expects shareholders to know the ultimate direction of the business in the medium term.

“We’ll either return the money to shareholders or put it into assets that will give shareholders a superior return,” he adds.

The company still has outstanding claims against other shareholders that run into billions of rands.

“It’s difficult to put value on these claims. The risks that you embark upon when you issue claims against other parties are substantial.

“But we have definite claims and we’ll have to see whether the legal system will support them and whether we are able to be successful,” he says.

The R330-million to be returned in the latest resolutions is in addition to the nihg-R1-billion paid out earlier plus 55% of JCI shares, taking the value of the total distribution to some R1,5-billion.

Over and above that, there is still the value of R&E itself at R2,60 a share.

There is still no finality on the company’s envisaged resource participation.

R&E holds a spread of prospecting rights in commodities including gold and iron-ore that may still be turned to account.

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