Artisanals point the way for African Gold Group

Miners have long been divided about artisanal miners working their concessions. Although the activity can at times lead to conflict, artisanals are widely credited with providing free — if inadvertently so — geological work.

Such is the case with African Gold Group (agg-v, aggff-o) at its Manso Atwere concession in Ghana.

Heavy artisanal activity at the site exposed a footwall from which African Gold took 52 channel samples.

The results were encouraging. Highlights included 2.36 grams gold per tonne over 22 metres, 2.73 grams over 12 metres, and 1.14 grams gold over 8 metres.

African Gold also says that two grab samples taken from the artisanal miners’ stockpile of ore returned assay values of 10.2 grams gold and 20.9 grams gold per tonne.

In all, 60 samples were taken and analyzed by an SGS laboratory in Ghana.

African Gold president Michael Nikiforuk says artisanals haven’t presented any problems for the company at this point.

“These people are well aware of the rule of law,” he says. “It’s an evolved jurisdiction.”

Nikiforuk credits company chairman Benjamin Adoo — a citizen of Ghana and the former president of the country’s chamber of mines — for his understanding of artisanals and for keeping relations smooth.

“Ben Adoo has travelled to the site with members of government with title in hand to meet with local chiefs and the local queen to advise them that things have changed and the title issue has been resolved, and we’re moving in to commence formal exploration initiatives,” Nikiforuk says. “They understand that.”

The title for Manso Atwere had been caught up in a 4-year court battle, but was put to rest with a favourable decision for African Gold in October. The long legal battle drew attention to the concession, which caused a huge increase in artisanal activity at the site.

Manso Atwere is the southern extension of the company’s 456-sq.-km Asankrangwa holdings — an area with five concessions that collectively contain a gold-in-soil anomaly that measures 24 km in strike length.

The northwestern flank of Asankrangwa is contiguous and on strike with Keegan Resources’ (KGN-V, KGNRF-O) recently discovered Esaase gold deposit, which has generated buzz by yielding a resource of 1.4 million oz. in just 12 months.

Nikiforuk is optimistic that Asankrangwa will soon be inspiring similar chatter. The company recently closed a financing deal that raised $6.8 million and plans to continue surface work with line-cutting, geochemical and geophysical work, as well as trenching and pitting.

Nikiforuk says there’s a 50/50 chance that drills will start turning before Christmas.

In Toronto on the results, the company’s shares closed down 2 at $1.03 on 60,000 shares traded. The Toronto-based company has roughly 32 million shares outstanding and its shares have traded between 80 and $2.15 over the past year.