SA state-diamond miner Alexkor has no plans to expand operations

South Africa’s state-owned diamond miner Alexkor is not interested in expanding beyond its current Alexander Bay Mining operations, in the Northern Cape, a government official has said.
The country’s Public Enterprises Minister Malusi Gigaba was quoted by Mining Weekly as saying that growing the business outside South Africa’s borders still remained a future option.
“No thorough feasibility study has been done on new mining opportunities beyond Alexander Bay. No funding allocation has been made for explorations,” he said.
This followed reports last year that Alexkor was in negotiations to pursue mining projects in Angola, the Democratic Republic of Congo and Zimbabwe.
He said that that the short- to medium-term strategic focus for Alexkor was to ensure that the pooling-and-sharing JV between the state-diamond miner and the Ritchersveld community was commercially viable, sustainable and fulfilled the developmental aims Pretoria had for Namaqualand.
Alexkor’s land and mining rights were transferred to the Richtersveld Mining Company (RMC) in line with a 2007 land restitution order.
The landside and marine rights were placed under the control of a joint board, with Alexkor holding 51 percent in the venture while the remaining 49 percent belonged to RMC.

Mathew Nyaungwa, Editor in Chief of the African Bureau, Rough&Polished