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Nexus Gold (NXS.V) has entered a letter of intent with BELEMYIDA SA (the “Optionor”), pursuant to which Nexus will acquire the right to earn up to 100% interest in the Rakounga Gold Property (the “Property”) located in Burkina Faso, West Africa.
The 250-square kilometre Rakounga Gold Property is contiguous to the Company’s Bouboulou gold concession. The Property borders Bouboulou on the west and south sides and hosts the Bouboulou 1 gold showing, which is the southern extension of the Bouboulou 2 trend. Bouboulou 1 is an active orpaillage with shaft workings that extend down approximately 80 metres.
“This is a substantial addition to the land package at Bouboulou, effectively making the project almost 300 sq-km in size. The acquisition allows us to follow the Bouboulou 2 and Pelatanga-Rawema trends to the southwest,” said President & CEO Peter Berdusco. “This addition is important when you consider how this might influence the goal of establishing a resource at Bouboulou. There is significant artisanal activity in this new area which indicates gold mineralization continues along the established trends for some distance. Our exploration programs will determine to what extent and obviously at what economic level, but we are excited at the potential value this strategic addition brings to the Company’s growing portfolio. We are looking forward to executing the definitive agreement in the coming weeks,” continued Mr. Berdusco.
Nexus will have an option to acquire a 90% interest in the Property, in consideration for cash payments of US$400,000 and the issuance of 575,000 common shares of Nexus, over a period of three years.
Following the acquisition of a 90% interest in the Property, Nexus will have the option to acquire the remaining 10% interest in the Property through a cash payment of US$1,000,000 with a 1% net smelter return royalty remaining with the Optionor.
The main Bouboulou concession covers an area of 38.3 square kilometers and is located approximately 100 kilometers north by northwest of the capital city of Ouagadougou. Exploration on the permit area has been conducted by Boliden (1997 – 1999), Riverstone Resources (2005 to 2011) and Roxgold Inc. (2011 to 2012).
The property is situated at the north end of the Boromo greenstone belt underlain by an alternating sedimentary-basalt-sedimentary-volcanic progression which strikes generally northeast-southwest, and is bisected by the Sabce Shear Zone, which hosts numerous artisanal gold zones over its 120-kilometre length plus the Bissa Mine operated by Nordgold.
Four zones of gold mineralization were previously identified on the property termed Koala, Rawema, Bouboulou 2 and Pelatanga. A fifth zone, Rawema West, was recently identified by Nexus geologists, as announced in a June 6, 2017 news release.
The Koala zone as well as the new Rawema West zone have both yielded strong samples, as announced in the June 6 news release. Highlights include high-grade quartz sample BBL-012, which contained visible gold, taken from an artisanal shaft (or orpaillage pit) 70 metres below surface at the Koala zone, that returned 66.1 grams-per-tonne (“g/t”) gold (“Au”). Sample BBL-013 (quartz material containing pyrite), also taken from an artisanal shaft at approximately 70 metres below surface, returned a value of 29 g/t Au.
The Rawema West zone occurs approximately 1000 metres west of the main workings at the previously identified Rawema site. The Artisanal workings extend some 150 metres in length and appear by observation to extend to depths of greater than 20 metres.
Company geologists collected 14 select rock samples of dump material from the Rawema West and Koala workings. Seven of the 14 samples returned values greater than 1 g/t Au. These results are tabled below:
Table 1
Sample ID Gold (g/t)
BBL-004 – 9.69
BBL-005 – 2.62
BBL-006 – 4.41
BBL-007 – 4.84
BBL-012 – 66.10
BBL-013 – 29.00
BBL-014 – 2.20
Bouboulou Phase One Drill Program
A total of 2000 metres of diamond drilling has been underway at Bouboulou since mid-June. Phase one drilling has been testing the Koala, Rawema and Bouboulou 2 zones, to depths of approximately 150 to 175 metres, as well as the newly identified Rawema West zone.
In 2011 and 2012 Roxgold Inc completed reverse circulation (RC) and diamond drilling (DD) programs to test the previously identified mineralized zones. Historical drilling highlights from Bouboulou can be found on the Company website here:
http://www.nexusgoldcorp.com/index.php/en/projects-3/bouboulou-gold-concession
The Company has subsequently identified three distinct 5000m (5km) long anomalous gold trends at the Bouboulou concession. Each of the three trends display strong coincidental geochemical and geophysical gold anomalies, and extend from the four previously drill-identified mineralized zones, namely Rawema, Pelatanga, Bouboulou 2 and Koala. They are identified by numerous orpaillages (artisanal workings) and geochemical samples of greater than 1 g/t Au. All three of the Bouboulou trends display similar coincidental anomalies. Each trend has substantial artisanal workings either directly on them, or along trend.
A map of the three trends can be seen online here:
http://www.nexusgoldcorp.com/images/NexusGold_Boub1.jpg
