By:Staff writer
A decision from the Ministry of Mines and Energy regarding the Hope and Gorob mining licence application ML 246 remains pending, Colin Bird, executive chairman of Bezant Resources, said last Friday.
“Exclusive Prospecting Licence 5796 has been extended to 19 October 2024. EPL 5796 is the licence within which the area of mining licence application ML 246 has been made,” Bird said.
He said further work on the drill core generated during the most recent programme to test near-surface mineralisation has been completed and the new database is under review by external resource consultant Addison Mining Services with a view to generating an additional open pit Mineral Resource Estimate in Q2 2023 to complement the existing underground resource.
“Personnel familiar with the Matchless Belt geology and in particular the Hope and Gorob style of mineralisation have been recruited to manage the next phase of exploration to test the balance of the known and projected strike length and other defined targets. Exploration will focus on additional drilling and it is aimed to commence this programme in Q2 2023,” he pointed out.
Bezant acquired 100% of Virgo Resources Ltd and its interests in the Hope Copper-Gold Project in Namibia. Virgo, through its 100% owned Australian subsidiary Hepburn Resources Pty Ltd (ACN 624 189 162), owns 70% of Hope and Gorob Mining Pty Ltd incorporated in Namibia which owns EPL5796, and 80% of Hope Namibia Mineral Exploration Pty Ltd Incorporated in Namibia which owns EPL6605 and EPL7170. The balance of the project is held by local Namibian partners.
On 9 August 2022 Bezant announced it had submitted a mining licence application for the Hope-Gorob copper-gold project area to the Namibian authorities.
The mining licence application is based on an updated Scoping Study completed in May 2022 by external consultants incorporating historic mineral resource estimates which did not yet include additional near-surface copper-gold resources generated by the Company’s shallow drill programme completed in early 2022.
The Scoping Study indicated that the potential for the development of a surface and underground copper mine exists at the Hope and Gorob deposits and recommended completion of the additional work required for optimisation of mine development plans including the work necessary to obtain granting of environmental permits.
The Scoping Study also recommended that further exploration work continues to fully define resource potential at these deposits.
The recently completed shallow drilling has continued to extend the strike and up-dip extension of mineralisation at both the Hope and Vendome prospects. The new drillholes have added more than 1.5km to the mineralised strike length, with the potential to add significantly to the previously estimated mineral resource.
Continuous copper and gold mineralisation has been intersected in drill intercepts over substantial downhole widths of up to 29.74m.
Metal recovery at the Hope project during previous ore processing tests was excellent, indicating recoveries of 96% copper and 84% gold to a 28% Cu grade concentrate via conventional flotation.
Review of past exploration on EPL5796 in the vicinity of the known deposits has highlighted several untested targets and potential extensions. These include a Natural Source Audio Magneto-Telluric (NSAMT) geophysics anomaly at the Hope deposit which indicates the presence of an untested, sub-parallel conductor a short distance to the north. This may suggest the presence of a hidden second or multiple shoot system over 3km of strike.
Gold is an important accompanying mineral to the copper deposits of the Matchless Belt. Core was not always assayed for gold during previous drilling campaigns, leaving scope for adding value to many of the prospects along the Belt, including Gorob-Vendome. Bezant will test for gold as a standard procedure during its planned exploration programmes, including planned confirmatory drilling at Gorob.
Elsewhere in the Project Area the Niedersachsen deposit cluster includes three previously discovered copper prospects (Niedersachsen, Aros and Kobos) within EPL 6605 and one copper prospect situated in EPL7170 (Schlesien, situated close to the north-eastern border of EPL 6605). While the primary historic exploration focus has been on the known prospects, but this has left the vast majority of the 1,200km2 area unexplored, especially by modern exploration techniques.