AngloGold Ashanti to officially pour first gold from reopened Obuasi Mine

This is coming after the AngloGold Ashanti mine in Obuasi resumed operations a year ago.

The mining company was closed down for about 4 years due to the invasion of its concession by illegal miners.

Obuasi has faced some challenges since AngloGold acquired the mine in 2003 and took over Ashanti Goldfields to create the current AngloGold Ashanti group.

The government intervened leading to a reopening of the mine site on January 22, 2019. This started the redevelopment project.

The redevelopment project is expected to take approximately 30 months to deliver. The mine has an approximate life span of 22 years to produce four hundred thousand ounces of gold per annum.

AngloGold Ashanti injected an initial amount of $881million to revamp the mining concession.

This is expected to be increased to $1.6 billion for the twenty-two-year period of the lifespan of the mine.

The Ghanaian government is expected to generate $2.16billion in revenue over the 22 years in royalties and withholding tax.

In June 2019, the mining company said it will recruit about 2,500 workers when it resumes full-scale operations at its Obuasi mine.

The Managing Director of the company, Eric Asubonteng, made this known at a Town Hall meeting organized by the mining giant with stakeholders in Obuasi.

The initial project capital cost for Obuasi remains “in a range of $495m to $545m spent between 2018 to the end of 2020.”