Mwana Africa’s board of directors have approved a proposal to change the company’s name to Asa Resource Group Plc at the annual general meeting in London as it moves to spread its interests beyond the continent.
The board said the future of the company lies in diversifying and reorganising its business along commodity lines focusing on nickel, gold, diamonds and copper and to stimulate growth through global international investment.
It felt that its name limited the scope of its activities to the continent.
“The company’s name is being changed to Asa Resource Group Plc. It is expected that trading in the company’s shares on AIM under its new name of Asa Resource Group Plc will commence on Thursday 1 October, 2015,” said the company after the AGM.
It said the new name would move forward from the company’s previous heritage and become recognisable on a global scale as it diversifies from its mainly Zimbabwean operations where it owns Freda Rebecca, the largest single gold mine in the country and Trojan nickel mine in Bindura through locally-listed Bindura Nickel Corporation.
The name change also removes vestiges of its founding chief executive, Kalaa Mpinga who left the group in June after sharp differences with the Chinese and other minority shareholders at last year’s annual general meeting over the company’s strategy.
Mpinga founded the group in 2003 and built it up by pulling together assets disposed by Anglo American and Ashanti Goldfields.
Mwana’s romance with CIMGC started in 2012 when the Chinese company came in with a $21 million investment to restart the group’s Bindura Nickel Corporation (BNC) which had collapsed at the height of the country’s economic meltdown.
Yat Hoi Ning took over as executive chairman following Mpinga’s ouster. He was re-elected at the AGM, along with non-executive director Yuan Ching Hu. The meeting also approved the appointment of Brian Ching Fung Hung as a non-executive director of the company.
The company said it is seeking new auditors to replace KPMG Audit Plc after a resolution to reappoint them was rejected at the AGM.- The Source
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