Verity Resources to Acquire Remaining 34% Interest In Botswana Polymetallic JV

Verity Resources (ASX: VRL) has exercised a pre-emptive right to acquire a 34% interest in the highly-prospective Botswana polymetallic joint venture (JV) from the liquidators winding up government subsidiary BCL Investments.

The portfolio, which sits along southern Africa’s Limpopo Mobile Belt, contains a total 2.4 million tonne resource comprising the advanced Maibele North copper-nickel-silver-gold-platinum group elements project and the high-grade Airstrip and Dibete copper-silver projects, along with several regional exploration targets across 143 square kilometres of acreage.

BCL has agreed to dissolve the joint venture and divest its equity to Verity for a cash consideration of $316,000.

Exploration Expenditure

Approximately $15 million has been spent on exploration at the Botswana projects since the start of the joint venture in 2012, including $4m by BCL at Maibele North until 2017.

The Botswana acquisition boosts the size of Verity’s regional critical minerals portfolio to 1,800 square kilometres, and complements the company’s flagship Monument gold project in Western Australia and rare earth element (REE) interests in Brazil.

The portfolio is just 50km from NexMetals Mining Corp’s Selebi nickel-copper mine and smelter, which has a resource of 18Mt grading 3.51% copper equivalent.

NexMetals received a US$150m Letter of Interest from the Export-Import Bank of the US in July to support the development of Selebi and its Selkirk project, also in Botswana.

‘Compelling Opportunity’

Verity director Patrick Volpe said the deal would add new highly-prospective copper-silver prospects with exceptionally high-grade intercepts returned from JV exploration.

“Taking sole ownership of a portfolio which has had over $15m spent to date for just $316,000 provides a compelling opportunity and simplifies our ability to advance these assets,” he said.

“Our value proposition is continually increasing—with a 154,000-ounce gold resource at Monument with resource expansion and upgrade drilling in progress, high-grade REE in Brazil, and now [these] exceptional projects in Botswana.”

“We now have control over a portfolio of projects containing in-demand, globally significant critical metals and minerals, in some of the best mining jurisdictions in the world.”

Broadly Analogous Discoveries

The historic Maibele North project contains nickel sulphide mineralisation related to ultramafic intrusions within mobile belt rocks and is broadly analogous in style to similar discoveries such as by IGO’s (ASX: IGO) Nova-Bollinger deposit, the Gonneville deposit (Chalice Mining, ASX: CHN) and the Thompson deposit along Canada’s globally-significant Thompson Belt.

A 2015 inferred mineral resource totalled 2.38Mt at 0.72% nickel and 0.21% copper with 0.63g/t 4PGE+Au (combined platinum, palladium, rhodium, ruthenium, and gold) using a 0.30% nickel cut-off.

Approximately 18km of reverse circulation and diamond drilling at Maibele North delineated sulphide zones over more than 1.3km strike, while follow-up infill and step-out drilling confirmed continuity and extended the deposit.

A large-scale AMT (audio-frequency magnetotelluric) survey in 2021 mapped strong conductors below and along strike of the resource, revealing multiple deep targets in the thickest part of the orebody and extending beyond known mineralisation.

Airstrip and Dibete Prospects

The Airstrip prospect comprises a cluster of copper-silver occurrences associated with shear-hosted sulphides in high-grade metamorphic rocks of the Magogaphate Shear Zone.

The area was first identified in the 1960s, with Verity re-initiating exploration in 2010 that included drilling, geophysics, and surface geochemistry.

Significant historic assays were 11 metres at 7.63% copper and 462 grams per tonne silver from 52m including 7m at 11.81% copper and 717g/t silver, and 3m at 22.74% copper and 1379g/t silver; 18m at 1.72% copper and 27.5g/t silver from 42m including 3m at 8.39% copper and 136.2g/t silver; and 8m at 1.71% copper and 51.1g/t silver from 159m.

Verity discovered the Dibete prospect 5km from Airstrip in 2010 along the same regional shear corridor, with mineralisation across two proximal zones over a combined strike length more than 300m.

Detailed drilling at Dibete in 2023 intersected new high-grade zones and confirmed mineralisation beyond historical shallow drilling, including an “exceptional” intercept of 25m at 2.17% copper and 77g/t silver from 27m.