Aim-listed Stratex International has entered into a conditional option agreement with a well-established Cameroonian company to acquire up to a 90% interest in two early-stage gold exploration projects, Bibemi and Wapouzé, in north Cameroon.
The company, Bureau d’Etudes et d’Investigations Géologico-minières, Géotechniques et Géophysiques (BEIG3) offers strong in-country technical and logistics support.
Stratex will manage the projects and BEIG3 will provide consulting and operational/logistics support under a technical support agreement.
Additionally, to support Stratex’s ongoing exploration programme, Stratex intends to raise between £1-million and £1.25-million through a share placement of 250-million shares at 0.5p apiece, which will primarily be used to progress the two projects.
The option agreement signed with BEIG3 for Stratex to earn up to a 90% interest in the projects will see Stratex earning an initial 51% of the projects by spending $1.56-million on exploration over two years – the minimum commitment being $560 000 within the first year.
The second option will enable Stratex to earn up to a further 39% interest in the projects for further exploration expenditure of $1.56-million, or the completion of a prefeasibility study on one of the projects, over the subsequent two years.
BEIG3 is to retain 10% free carried interest in the projects up to completion of the second option or the completion of a prefeasibility study on one project.
Stratex CEO Tim Livesey said BEIG3 formerly held the projects in a joint venture with TSX-listed Reservoir Minerals, but these have been returned 100% to BEIG3.
Bibemi comprises 202 km2 and Wapouzé comprises 181 km2, both with gold mineralisation established by Reservoir in 2014.