[miningmx.com] – VETERAN coal industry executive John Wallington has joined Buffalo Coal (Buffalo) as a director making this the third coal junior mining company he has worked with since resigning as CEO of Anglo American Coal (Amcoal) in 2008.
He joins a number of other ex-Amcoal executives at Buffalo (previously Forbes & Manhattan Coal) which is currently involved in a dispute with the Department of Mineral Resources (DMR) over the mining right to the Aviemore Colliery in Kwa-Zulu Natal.
The DMR withdrew one of the mining rights covering Aviemore on August 27, but Buffalo immediately brought an urgent application opposing this action. Mining operations at Aviemore are continuing until the urgent application is heard next week.
After leaving Amcoal – reportedly after major disagreements with then CEO, Cynthia Carroll, Wallington became CEO of Coal of Africa (CoAL) in May 2010 and took on what Miningmx subsequently described as “the worst job in South African mining’.
Everything that could go wrong for a coal mining junior did go wrong for CoAL and Wallington spent most of the next three years in what he has described as “a continuous fire fighting role’.
After leaving CoAL, Wallington stunned coal industry observors in September 2013 by taking on the position of MD at Miranda Minerals – one of the biggest junior mining “dogs’ ever listed on the JSE – and which has now been suspended from trading.
There he fell out a year later with erstwhile partner and mining entrepreneur, Rudolph de Bruin, alleging that De Bruin reneged on a promise to invest R20m in the business. De Bruin denied the allegation.
So, third time around with Buffalo, Wallington should at least have a clear understanding of what he’s getting into because he knows most of the top executives from his time running Amcoal.
Buffalo chairman, Craig Wiggill, is the former marketing director at Amcoal while Buffalo CEO, Malcolm Campbell, spent 20 years with Amcoal in various positions, and Buffalo Coal Dundee GM, Kevern Mattison, worked at a string of Amcoal’s collieries.
Wallington comments: “I was asked by Craig to join the Buffalo board and I accepted because I have a tremendous amount of respect for him and am happy to assist where I can. I will be getting involved mainly on the technical and safety sides.’
But Wallington now also has huge experience from his time at CoAL and Miranda of what can go wrong in the murky world of junior mining which executives from major mining houses such as Anglo American may not necessarily be up to speed with.
Asked whether he might become involved in the Aviemore issue Wallington replied: “If they ask me to help out I will. As a result of my legacy with CoAL I know the DMR quite well.’
Also just appointed to the Buffalo board is another coal mining “blast from the past’ – so to speak – and that is Eddie Scholtz who rose to the position of MD of BHP Billiton’s South African coal mining operations before joining the former CIC Energy from which he retired in 2012.
