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AXMIN Inc. announced two new appointments to its development team that is responsible for construction of the wholly-owned Passendro Gold Project, located in the Central African Republic.
The addition of Mike Edwards as Project Director and Geoff McLoughlin as Engineering Manager will broaden AXMIN’s existing skill base for the construction at Passendro which is anticipated to begin in 2012. Mr. Mike Edwards, a Senior Project Director with over 40 years experience, 25 of which were in high-level positions, managing the construction and development of major mining, hydroelectric, civil and earthworks projects primarily throughout sub-Saharan Africa. As Senior VP Projects for MagIndustries Corp., Mike was responsible for the Group’s hydroelectric, mining and forestry projects in central Africa. Prior to that Mike was Divisional Director at Grinaker-LTA, a South African construction and engineering group focused on infrastructure, energy and mining projects. Over the 22 years with Grinaker-LTA, Mike was responsible for major studies and construction of many civil and mining projects including the 870 km gas pipeline from South Africa to Mozambique, Phase I of the Tarkwa Gold Mine project in Ghana and the Sadiola Gold Mine in Mali. Mr. Geoff McLoughlin, a process Metallurgist, has 25 years senior level design and operational experience with gold mining projects and operations throughout Central Asia and Africa. As Chief Metallurgist for MAED Limited, Geoff’s experience included the design and commissioning of metallurgical operations for several gold operations in Central Asia. In particular, as Metallurgical Process Manager at the Amantaytau Goldfields 1 mtpa Milling Leach CIP operation; Geoff took the project from commissioning to a production capacity 60% higher than designed on budget and on time. Prior to that, Geoff was responsible for managing the Phase I and II of expansions at Randgold’s Syama Gold Mine in Mali, and was Plant Manager for four of Harmony Gold’s South African gold mines. Geoff has considerable recent experience in gold plant project implementation by leading the process as well as engineering design. President and CEO of AXMIN, Mr. George Roach, comments, “These high-level appointments to AXMIN’s Passendro mine development team is a signal to the market of our confidence in our ability to both finance and build CAR’s first modern gold mine. AXMIN is in the midst of a very busy period as it prepares for the construction of the Passendro project, while at the same time continuing to negotiate with banking consortiums for the remainder of the debt required. During this quarter we hope to advise our shareholders on the finalization of both the legal and technical due diligence; the award of the critical contracts required to finalize the terms for the debt package namely, the EPCM, fuel supply, power and mining equipment contracts; as well as the initiation of an exploration drill program targeting resource and reserve expansion.” |
