Modern Mining January 2018

MINING News

Tango to acquire Botswana property

development of a Tier One copper mine at Kamoa-Kakula,” he said. “Hydropower, with its virtues of being clean and renewable, is the best energy solution to support our development priorities as we continue to look for ways to reduce our impact on the environ- ment and produce the copper the world requires.” Mwadingusha is the first of three hydropower plants that Ivanhoe and Zijin plan to upgrade. Upgrading of the other two existing hydroelectric power plants – Koni and Nzilo 1 – is expected to begin once Mwadingusha’s upgrading is completed. The Mwadingusha and Koni plants are in cascade, with Koni directly downstream from Mwadingusha on the Lufira River at the mouth of Lake Tshangalele, north of Likasi and approximately 250 km north- east of the Kamoa mine development site. The Nzilo 1 plant is on the Lualaba River, downstream of Nzilo Lake and north of the city of Kolwezi, approximately 40 km from Kamoa. 

of a 100 km 2 area of river terrace gravels containing diamonds and heavy mineral concentrations, mainly garnets and ilmen- ites. Although the diamond content of the gravels has never been assessed systemati- cally, diamonds of up to 0,55 carats were recovered. The source of diamonds in the gravels is not known but it could be the Molopo kimberlite cluster located immediately to the north-east. In addition, Falconbridge and Botswana Government airborne geo- physics over the property have defined geophysical targets which may be kimber- lites and the source of the diamonds. Tango holds an interest in the Oena diamond mine, a producing alluvial dia- mond property located in South Africa’s Northern Cape Province. It also has a three-year renewable ‘Risk Services Agreement for Mining of Diamonds’ with Txapemba Canguba RL, which was granted an 84 km 2 concession within the Luembe River basin, Angola. 

Tango Mining, listed on the TSX-V, is to acquire a 75 % unencumbered interest in an alluvial diamond property in Botswana called the Middlepits project from Metswedi Mining (Pty) Ltd. Tango will be responsible for all further exploration and development expenditures on the prop- erty upon closing. The property is located 470 km south- west of Gaborone and 90 km south-west of Tshabong in the Kgalagadi District. It consists of one Prospecting Licence (PL) and was explored between 1974 and 1976 by De Beers, between 1978 and 1980 by Falconbridge and between 1993 and 1997 by Southern Africa Minerals Corporation. The exploration work by De Beers iden- tified an occurrence of diamondiferous gravels in the centre of the property. The diamondiferous gravels were evaluated by both hand augering and digging and were then screened and processed for dia- monds and heavy minerals. The work resulted in the identification

January 2018  MODERN MINING  11