Abzu Gold Announces Management Changes
VANCOUVER, BRITISH COLUMBIA -- (Marketwire) -- 02/17/11 -- Abzu Gold Ltd. (TSX VENTURE: ABS) (the 'Company') is pleased to announce changes to its management team as part of its growth into a prominent gold explorer in West Africa. These changes are in step with the company's plans to aggressively explore for gold on its concessions in West Africa.
Dr. Paul Klipfel, a gold specialist with over 32 years of experience, has been appointed as President of the Company. Mr. Gordon Neal has accepted an appointment to the Board of Directors of the Company as Chairman. Mr. Jeffrey Pontius, CEO of International Tower Hill Mines has also joined the Board of Directors. Mr. Neal and Mr. Pontius will replace Antony Claydon & Balbir Johal as directors. We would like to extend our appreciation for their contribution and service to the company.
In addition to the new directors Mr. Serwa will remain as CEO. Mr. Ross McDonald will become Chief Financial Officer for the Company, replacing Mr. Chris Cherry, who is thanked for his contribution and service to the Company. The Corporate Secretary is Ms. Sue Chipperfield, who joined the Company on January 6, 2011.
New President Dr. Klipfel, stated, 'It is a great pleasure to join this strong team and be able to conduct gold exploration with the quality financial and managerial support essential to achieving success. Ghana is a world-class place with extraordinary endowment of gold mineralization. We have concessions in key areas just waiting to be explored.'
CEO and founder of Abzu, Mr. Allan Serwa states, 'It is with great pleasure that we welcome Dr. Paul Klipfel to the Management Team of Abzu Gold Ltd. His expertise, qualifications and his many successful experiences will lead us toward aggressive developmental growth on our current properties and be key in building our project base here in West Africa.'
MANAGEMENT TEAM
Allan Serwa, CEO & Director
Mr. Serwa is the founder of Abzu and responsible for undertaking the company's ten concession acquisitions and their initial exploration in Ghana and Cote d'Ivoire. He has been living and working in Ghana since 2007 where he has brought about responsible corporate growth through alignment with Ghanaian traditional culture and their pride in the national gold industry.
He brings to the company successful corporate and operational management background. Mr. Serwa has been an officer and Director of several private and publicly owned companies in Canada and West Africa. He is currently a Director of Cardero Ghana Ltd.
Dr. Paul D. Klipfel, Ph.D., President
Dr. Klipfel has over 32 years of mineral exploration experience and project development for a wide range of mineral commodities and deposit types in North America, South America, Australia, South Pacific, Africa, and Asia. He has been an effective explorer specializing in the relationship between geologic structure and mineralization. He has been a contributor to the discovery process on several major gold deposits including Las Cristinas, Venezuela (greater than 12Moz); Musselwhite, Ontario, Canada (greater than 5Moz); Esaase, Ghana (4.9Moz); Livengood, Alaska, USA (greater than 10Moz). Deposit modeling at the Musselwhite Mine in northern Ontario resulted in addition to reserves of greater than 1M oz of gold. He has worked for, or consulted to numerous major and junior companies including Placer Dome Inc., Newmont Mining Corp., Barrick Gold Corp, Kinross Gold Corp., in a range of capacities. He holds a Ph.D. in Economic Geology (1992) and an M.S. in Mineral Economics (1988) from Colorado School of Mines, a M.S. in Geology from University of Idaho (1981), and a B.A. in geology from San Francisco State University (1978). He is currently on the Board of Directors of Trevali Resources Corp. and has been President of Mineral Resource Services Inc., a successful consulting practice based in Reno, Nevada for the past eight years.
Ross McDonald, Chief Financial Officer
Mr. McDonald is a Chartered Accountant, and a member of the Institute of Chartered Accountants of British Columbia since 1968. He has a broad range of experience in public company accounting and finance, providing accounting, audit and tax services to small and medium sized businesses. The majority of his clients are in the resource industry and include public companies, mining professionals, exploration service companies and consultants. He serves on the Board of Directors of Fjordland Exploration Ltd. and Miranda Gold Corp.
Sue Chipperfield, Corporate Secretary
Ms. Chipperfield has 8 years' experience of working for exploration companies, specializing in Administration and Corporate Secretary field. Since January 2010, she has worked as Corporate Secretary to Balmoral Resources Ltd., a TSXV listed junior exploration company.
Sue previously worked for West Timmins Mining Inc. where she served in the role of Executive Assistant to the President. She was responsible for regulatory filings, compliance and office administration for the Company from May, 2008 until its acquisition by Lake Shore Gold in a deal valued at $424 million which was completed in November of 2009.
Prior to that, Ms. Chipperfield worked for Gitennes Exploration Inc., a TSX-V listed junior exploration company, for 5 years in a similar capacity.
Quentin Mai, Director, Corporate Communications
Quentin has extensive experience providing professional corporate communications, investor relations and business development services to publicly listed companies in both the Canadian and US equities markets. He brings 20 years of professional commerce experience to the organization - including five years in Asia. For the five years until December 31, 2010, Quentin served as Vice President, Corporate Communications for International Tower Hill Mines (ITH) directing market awareness and investor programs originating from company inception to market capitalization exceeding $850M. While at ITH, Quentin facilitated equity raises totaling $200M and coordinated over $400M investment in the open market in 2010.
Richard Mark Serwa, Director, Social Development
Mark worked as a Social Planner and Director for several world leading manufacturers before joining Abzu. Aside from planning and implementing large scale social programs, he has personally dedicated himself to safety in the work place and holds several certificates that are recognized around the world. He will be responsible for implementing a three phase social program in the Manso Nkwanta Region of Ghana. He is overseeing Phase I, which employs 25 Ghanaians from local villages. Mark is working directly with the Paramount Chief of the Manso Nkwanta, a traditional leader that also holds a percentage in one of Abzu's senior properties.
BOARD OF DIRECTORS
Gordon Neal, Chairman & Director
Gordon Neal has more than twenty-five years' experience in in providing corporate finance and corporate governance services to public companies. He founded Neal McInerney Investor Relations in 1991. Through marketing more than $4 billion in debt and equity financings, the company grew to be the second largest full service Investor Relations firm in Canada with offices in Vancouver, Toronto and Los Angeles. Clients included; BCE, Nortel, Bell Canada International, Bell Mobility, Intrawest, Canaccord Capital, BMO Nesbitt Burns, and TVX Gold.
Gordon Neal is currently the Vice President Corporate Development at MAG Silver Corp. He was also an advisor on corporate finance and investor relations to West Timmins Mining. He has raised more than $400 million for mining and resources companies since 2004.
He currently serves on the board of Rockgate Capital with uranium and silver assets in Mali West Africa as well as being a director of Dorato Resources with gold properties in Peru. He is also on the board of Balmoral Resources, a gold company with projects in Quebec and Ontario.
Gordon Neal graduated from Dalhousie University with a B.Sc. in Biochemistry in 1977. He was President of the Dalhousie Student Union in 1976-77. He has also served as a member of the Dalhousie University Senate and Board of Governors.
Dr. Mark Cruise, Ph.D., Director
Dr. Cruise has in excess of 18 years of global experience in the mineral exploration industry from grass-roots exploration through resource definition to production. He spent eight years employed by Anglo American plc where he was responsible for the company's exploration portfolio in Europe and North America. Dr. Cruise is the President and CEO of Trevali Resource Corp. and a director of Dorato Resources Ltd. He has a B.A. Mod (hons) degree in Geology and an industry funded Ph.D. degree in Economic Geology from Trinity College Dublin, Ireland.
Jeffrey Pontius, Director
Mr. Pontius has over 30 year's geological experience and possesses a distinguished track record of successful discovery that includes four precious metal deposits in North America. Significantly, he led the discovery and development team for Cripple Creek Deposit in Colorado, which is operated by AngloGold Ashanti and now totals over 20 million ounces of gold. In 2006 Mr. Pontius left AngloGold and founded International Tower Hill Mines Ltd. which in 2007 discovered the Livengood gold deposit in Alaska which now totals nearly 20 million ounces of gold and is proceeding to development. Additionally, Mr. Pontius led the discovery work on two other Nevada gold deposits in the 1980's.
Mr. Pontius has served as the US and North American Exploration Manager for AngloGold Ashanti, Director of Anglo American (USA) Exploration Inc. and is currently the CEO of International Tower Hill Mines and CEO and Chairman for Corvus Gold Inc. He holds a Masters Degree from the University of Idaho in Economic Geology, a BSc from Huxley College of Environmental Studies and a BSc from Western Washington University in Geology.
ADVISORY BOARD
Darin Wagner
Darin is currently President & CEO of Balmoral Resources and formerly from West Timmins Mining Inc., where he was President, CEO, Director and Qualified Person from its inception, through the discovery of the high-grade Thunder Creek Gold Zone in Timmins, Ontario and through WTM's sale to Lake Shore Gold Corp. in an all share deal valued at $424 million completed in November of 2009.
Terry Lyons
Terry is currently Chairman of Northgate Minerals Corporation and a director and officer of several public corporations including Director, BC Pacific Capital Corporation; Canaccord Capital Inc. (Audit Committee Chair), Diamonds North Resources Ltd. and the Vancouver Convention Centre Expansion Project Ltd., as well as several private corporations. He is a past Vice Chairman of Battle Mountain Gold Company (Audit, Special Committee), former Chairman of Westmin Resources Limited and is currently Chairman of the Mining Association of BC.
On behalf of the board of directors of ABZU GOLD LTD.
Allan Serwa, Chief Executive officer
Neither TSX Venture Exchange nor its Regulation Services Provider (as that term is defined in the policies of the TSX Venture Exchange) accepts responsibility for the adequacy or accuracy of this press release, which has been prepared by management.
Contacts:
Abzu Gold Ltd.
Quentin Mai
Director, Corporate Communications
604-638-3288
www.abzugold.com