Sylla Gold Corp. has until August 31, 2024, to close the acquisition of Namibia Critical Metals’ four assets in Namibia.
Sylla wants to acquire a 95% interest in Namibia Critical Metals’ Namibian subsidiaries that own the rights, title, and interest to the Grootfontein, Erongo, Otjiwarongo, and Kaoko licenses and certain associated assets.
The assets encompass 2,788 square kilometres.
The parties announced on March 19, 2024, that closing was subject to the satisfaction (or waiver) of a number of conditions precedent, including, but not limited to, receipt of all regulatory approvals and the acceptance of the TSX Venture Exchange.
Sylla Gold Corp. announced Thursday that the transaction’s closing date has been amended and extended to August 31, 2024.
The company said all other agreement terms remain in full force and effect.
The agreement entails that Sylla Gold Corp. will issue the vendor 3 million ordinary shares at a deemed issuance price of $0.05 per common share and pay an aggregate cash payment of US$100,000 to the vendor.
All securities issued under the acquisition will be subject to a statutory hold period of four months and one day from the issuance thereof, as applicable, by applicable securities laws.
The transaction is a non-arms-length transaction under TSX Venture Exchange policies, as Darrin Campbell, President and a director of NCMI, is also a director of Sylla Gold.
Grootfontein is an early-stage conceptual target based on the geophysical and historical evidence for a large buried mafic-ultramafic intrusive complex. It is a poorly explored geological complex due to the extensive cover of Kalahari sands and calcrete.
Based on historic drill holes and airborne magnetic survey interpretations, Grootfontein constitutes a mafic complex covering 360 km2 with the potential to host magmatic copper-nickel deposits as cumulates or late magmatic disseminations and stockworks.
Previous work by Ongopolo Mining proved that the main intrusive phases are depleted in nickel and copper. The metals were likely fractionated as sulphides during the intrusive phase, accumulating gravitationally in the magma and intruding in the adjacent, pre-existing rocks. Following geological models for classic mafic-hosted copper-nickel deposits such as Norilsk and Voisey’s Bay, subsidization by scavenging of sulphur from country rocks and tectonic-magmatic concentration of the sulphide-rich melts is the key to the formation of these types of magmatic copper-nickel deposits.
Only two shallow drill fences (a total of 1,386 m) were drilled by Anglo American in 1988, leaving 55 km of strike length untested.
There is also a potential for Mississippi Valley-type lead-zinc deposits that may be highly enriched in vanadium immediately north of the mafic complex, as demonstrated by the nearby Berg Aukas deposit. According to historical records, Berg Aukas is a former producing mine that produced 1.6 Mt of ore grading 16.77% Zn, 4.04% Pb, and 0.93% V2O5 from 1967–1975. The Grootfontein project area hosts favourable carbonate stratigraphy for this deposit type immediately west of Berg Aukas.
Thirdly, much of the southern portion of the project area is considered prospective for gold, based on the premise that extensions of the Okonguarri Formation, which hosts the Otjikoto and Navachaab gold mines, trend through the area.
The company plans to fly a combined airborne electromagnetic-magnetic survey in April of 2019, effectively detecting associated sulphide mineralization with these deposit types and conducting targeted soil sample surveys over magnetic anomalies associated with gold mineralization.
Otjiwarongo is another early-stage conceptual target. The area is almost entirely under sand/soil cover; however, airborne magnetic and satellite imagery data indicate the possibility of an alkaline intrusive complex.
It is, therefore, considered prospective for rare earth elements or fluorspar similar to the Okorusu carbonatite complex, which hosts the Okorusu fluorspar deposits. The same area may be prospective for gold, based on the premise that extensions of the Okonguarri Formation, which hosts the Otjikoto and Navachab gold mines, trend through the area.
The area will be assessed by selective soil sampling, with particular attention to the magnetic anomalies indicative of either the alkaline intrusive complexes or sulphide mineralization associated with gold, characteristic of the Otjikoto deposit.
The Erongo gold project covers an area of over 600 km2 within the Navachab-Ondundu gold trend. There are numerous mineral occurrences within the project area, including at least two gold occurrences.
The area has been prospected but has yet to be explored systematically. Potential targets include skarn and greisen gold (copper-bismuth) and tin-tungsten mineralization; pegmatites formed during the late Damaran orogeny, hosting lithium minerals and semi-precious stones; and structurally controlled gold mineralization.
Historical figures indicate small-scale mining for all deposit types on the property.
