SSC Group receives Ministerial consent for the Vantage Goldfields takeover

25th January 2019 By: Tasneem Bulbulia - Senior Contributing Editor Online

Siyakhula Sonke Empowerment Corporation’s (SSC) transfer of Vantage Goldfields and its assets, the Lily and Barbrook Mines, near Barberton, in Mpumalanga, to black-owned subsidiary Flaming Silver Trading 373, has become unconditional, the company announced in a statement on Thursday.

SSC and Flaming Silver Trading 373, collectively called SSC Group, on December 21, 2018, received Ministerial consent in terms of Section 11(1) of the Mineral and Petroleum Resources Development Act (MPRDA), for the transfer of the controlling interests in Vantage Goldfields, including Barbrook Mine and all its other subsidiaries, and Makonjwaan Imperial Mining Company.

The statement emphasised that the DMR confirmed that it was satisfied that all the relevant prescripts in terms of the MPRDA were followed prior to the Section 11 application.

SSC Group plans to start a “clean reset” of the business rescue process of the assets under a new business rescue practitioner (BRP) after a dispute with the current BRP.

SSC Group is seeking the removal of the current BRP.

SSC Group is also pursuing the earliest opportunity to present a credible, defensible business rescue plan for approval by the affected persons associated with the three Vantage companies under business rescue.

The group has reviewed the initial business plans and has developed and will be submitting its new plans in preparation of the publishing of a “robust and realistic” business rescue plan with defined time lines.

“Since the approval of Section 11, we have been engaging with the Industrial Development Corporation to review the initial conditions of the funding structure and consider the robustness of the revised business plan,” says SSC CEO Fred Arendse.