Page 57 - pd245 Dec16-Jan17 web_Neat

Momentum keeps building
for busy West African
West African Resources Ltd
expects to release the find-
ings of its highly anticipated DFS
on the Tanlouka gold project,
Burkina Faso, in late January.
The market kept a close eye on
West African through 2016 fol-
lowing a high-grade gold discov-
ery at M1 South last February,
shortly after the company’s stock
fell to a record low of 4.5c/share.
In August, West African un-
veiled a maiden resource
of 290,000t @ 10.3 g/t gold
for 96,000oz (indicated) and
410,000t @ 6.4 g/t for 83,000oz
(inferred) for M1 South, lifting the
total project resource to 9.8mt @
2.1 g/t for 670,000oz (indicated)
and 10.7mt @ 2 g/t for 695,000oz
(inferred).
An updated resource for M1 as
well as the M3 and M5 deposits
is due in early December.
West African managing direc-
tor Richard Hyde said the DFS was fo-
cused on a CIL operation rather than the
heap leach scenario his company had
been working on for the past two years.
“Because we’ve done so much work
previously on the heap leach, we were
able to transition directly into feasibility
on our CIL project,” Hyde told Paydirt.
“One of the benefits is we’ve got a
lot of oxide material, so 10-12mt of ox-
ide material we were planning on heap
leaching we’re now going to put straight
through our CIL project. Obviously it has
better recoveries and it’s more bankable
because banks are much more willing to
fund a conventional CIL project.
“Right now we’re only focusing on
open-pittable material, but there’s going
to be potential to optimise and improve
the economics once we’ve got the fea-
sibility study finished and we’ll look at
including underground material as well
because portions of M1 and M5 have
definitely got underground potential giv-
en their very high-grade mineralisation.”
At the time of print, West African was
finalising the plant design and complet-
ing the last remaining metallurgical test
work from M1 and M5.
Hyde recently met with Burkina Faso’s
new Minister of Energy, Mines and Quar-
ries, Alfa Oumar Dissa, and was confi-
gold from 209m (including 2m @
315.3 g/t) 13m @ 0.65 g/t from
81m (including 1m @ 1,107.5
g/t), 5m @ 30.28 g/t from 216m
(including 1m @ 104.95 g/t) and
14m @ 11.82 g/t from 224m (in-
cluding 1m @ 131.8 g/t).
“The grades are outstanding
and that gives you a lot of flexibili-
ty on developing a mine schedule
and also designing a plant,” Hyde
said. “It also gives you scope for
scale because we’ve got lower-
grade, soft material at M5 that we
can blend through with the very
high-grade material from M1.
“Our geologists believe the
mineralisation should persist at
depth and we’ve demonstrated
that in our most recent drilling.
There’s no reason why this min-
eralisation wouldn’t be economic
West African recorded a number of spectacular down to 800m or 1,000m vertical,
drilling results at M1 South in 2016 given the grade.”
West African will continue drill-
dent his company would receive a min- ing at Tanlouka to confirm mineralisation
ing licence and an environmental permit continues at depth and may soon open
in the coming months. studies on potential underground mining
It has been a whirlwind year for West options.
African and certainly one Hyde did not Hyde also met with new Burkina Faso
think was possible after desperately rat- President Roch Marc Christian Kaboré
tling the tin for a modest raise of $2.04 earlier this year and praised the coun-
million last December. try’s new leader for the
“It was the most difficult stability he had brought
capital raising I’ve done since being elected to
since I started the com- power in late 2015.
pany [in 2010],” he said. “He’s got a mandate
“It’s been a very busy to put his policies for-
year. We haven’t taken ward and one of those
our foot off the pedal is to have a vibrant and
once.” strong gold mining sec-
The rigs have hardly tor in Burkina Faso,”
stopped turning at Tan- Hyde said.
louka since the M1 South “All investors in all
discovery and West Afri- companies in Burkina
can raised $12.5 million require stability so we
and a further $21 million can move forward and
on the back of impressive Richard Hyde remain invested in the
drilling results. country. What we’ve
“The old saying goes seen generally this year
‘grade is king’ and when you have high- is resource stability and our view is that it
grade mineralisation, the funds looking to should persist.”
invest in gold companies certainly sit up – Michael Washbourne
and take notice,” Hyde said. “It really is a
point of difference.”
Among the best intersections record-
ed at M1 South were 16m @ 69.11 g/t
AUSTRALIA’S PAYDIRT DECEMBER 2016 - JANUARY 2017 PAGE 57