[miningmx.com] – MWANA Africa CEO, Kalaa Mpinga, acknowledged that his future at the company may turn on how Chinese shareholders controlling 29% of the firm vote at an extraordinary general meeting (EGM) scheduled for June 9.
The EGM has been called by a group of shareholders holding 5.1% of the Zimbabwe gold and nickel firm calling themselves the Concerned Shareholder Group (CSG), led by Mark Wellesley-Wood, the former chairman of Mwana Africa.
The CSG maintain there have been significant breaches of corporate governance at Mwana Africa and question why a dispute between the Mwana board and shareholders Yat Hoi Ning and China International Mining Group Corporation has been taken to court.
Wellesley-Wood told Miningmx on May 21 that Mwana Africa represented unfinished business following his abrupt resignation from the board in February 2014 ostensibly related to a difference over strategy.
Said Wellesley-Wood: “This is not about revenge. This is about focusing on the company’s operations and shareholder value.’
Mpinga said in an interview on May 20 that he was unaware how the Chinese would vote on the matter. “The Chinese have decided that owing to legal action they will not take a view or disclose what their approach is going to be,” he said.
The dispute is about the composition of the board after Ling attempted to first take the chairmanship and then – even though Mwana’s board eventually agreed to this step – he recommended all the executive board members be removed.
Mpinga said his board and the Chinese were “close to reaching a settlement on litigation with the Chinese”. However, the calling of the EGM had confused matters: “We actually were discussing a new structure,” he said.
Commenting on the resignation of Wellesley-Wood last year, Mpinga disclosed that the board rejected the former DRD CEO’s personal demands.
In documents handed by the Chinese shareholders to Mpinga, the Mwana board realised that Wellesley-Wood was hoping for the company to pay relocation fees to Johannesburg as well as share options totalling £1m that could not be diluted. “There was a unanimous decision to vote him off,” said Mpinga.
Said Mpinga of the dispute with the CSG, the Chinese and Wellesley-Wood: “I find this puts me in a strange situation. The conversation always starts with: ‘this is not about you, it’s about the board’.
“But I’m like, gentlemen, can you decide how you want this to go and then we can focus on running the company. For me it’s unnecessary; it’s a big waste of money”.
