DMR gives the green light for Afarak’s Zeerust chrome mine

26th October 2018 By: Marleny Arnoldi - Deputy Editor Online

Aim-listed Afarak Group has been granted a Section 11 approval for its Zeerust chrome mine, by the Department of Mineral Resources (DMR), and preparations are under way to start operations during the fourth quarter.

The Section 11 approval allows Afarak to start mining and to secure an own-supply of high-quality ore for its smelter in Mogale.

Mogale will now be the only South African smelter capable of producing high-carbon ferrochrome, Afarak stated.

The Zeerust mine has an opencast resource of about two-million tonnes, if mined up to a 35 m high wall. Additional resources exist in the 1.2-million-tonne tailings dump.

Meanwhile, Afarak will, on November 12, address the election of a new board of directors, independent of the company’s main shareholder Danko Koncar.

Afarak received a request from shareholders which hold a collective 11.09% of shares to convene an extraordinary meeting to discuss the dismissal of the current board and election of new board members.

Afarak Group has also received notifications from shareholders Atkey and LNS, who hold more than 56% of the shares and voting rights, that they will vote against these proposals.

The proposal to dismiss the board follows after the Finnish Financial Supervisory Authority said Koncar, and entities controlled by him, have acted together with Hino Resources, Finaline Business and Koncar’s spouse to exercise control in Afarak.

Their combined voting rights amount to about 41.56%.

The authority subsequently ordered Koncar to pay a £40-million fine, as well as a supplementary amount of £10-million, that has accrued from noncompliance to buy out Afarak shares.

However, the fine is not yet legally valid, since Koncar appealed the authority’s decision to the Helsinki Administrative Court.