West African gold company Gryphon Minerals (ASX:GRY) has announced an alliance with Tawana Resources (ASX:TAW) with an initial move for the alliance into Liberia, which is largely underexplored for gold and and has potential to host world class mineral deposits.
As consideration for Tawana to acquire permits in Liberia from Gryphon, Gryphon will receive 100,000,000 shares, equal to a 15% shareholding in Tawana.
The deal will enable Gryphon to focus on its Banfora Gold Project in Burkina Faso and the Tijirit Gold Project in Mauritania, while maintaining an exploration exposure to Liberia and other parts of West Africa for gold and other minerals outside its core geographical strategy.
Tawana will acquire five permits in Liberia, West Africa covering approximately 3800 km2 of underexplored and highly prospective Archean and Birimian greenstone belts are currently under application, with the expectation of granting in the near term.
Areas under application cover previously unexplored Archean and Birimian greenstone belts with sequences of banded iron formations, volcanoclastics and mafic rock types that are highly prospective for gold mineralisation.
There are reports of artisanal workings along the belts which have had no modern day gold exploration undertaken on them. The mineral permit applications are for both gold and base metal exploration.
Three of the permits are adjacent to the world class Ity gold mine (5Moz) and along strike from New Liberty gold deposit (1.5Moz).
Steve Parsons, Managing director of Gryphon said “the alliance with Tawana combines the exploration and technical expertise of both companies and effectively delivers to Gryphon a low risk, early stage exploration arm”.