Africa Oil acquires 20% stake in Azinam

Africa Oil Corp has announced that the government of South Africa, has approved the acquisition of a 20% participating interest in the Block 3B/4B Exploration Right from Azinam Limited by its wholly-owned subsidiary, Africa Oil SA Corp.

Africa Oil Corp will assume operatorship for the joint venture partners while Azinam will retain a 20% participating interest and Ricocure Ltd has retained a 60% participating interest.

The company stated that block 3B/4B is located in the Orange Basin offshore South Africa and covers an area of 17,581 square kilometres in water depths ranging from 300 to 2,500 meters.

Africa Oil also stated that it will participate in a R596m ($40m) capital raising by Impact Oil & Gas Limited, the privately-owned, African-focused exploration company on or about 14 February 2020. The Company will subscribe for approximately 45.0 million ordinary shares at an issue price of 20 pence per ordinary share, for an investment of approximately R177m ($12m).

Impact expects to use the proceeds to fund its interest in potentially high impact 2020 drilling campaigns.

Keith Hill, Africa Oil’s president and CEO, said: “We are pleased to add Block 3B/4B to our inventory of exploration interests in South Africa. Together with our equity interests in Impact Oil and Gas and Africa Energy Corp., Africa Oil has a significant footprint in several emerging plays extending from South Africa to Namibia, where both Total and Shell plan to drill potential play-openers in 2020 and at the same time are increasing their positions in other blocks adjacent to Block 3B/4B.”

Hill said from existing 3D seismic surveys, the company has identified a number of similar prospects to those that the majors are targeting. “In the near term, we are now looking forward to the drilling of Venus-1 and Luiperd-1 exploration wells, that in case of exploration success, can have significant upside for our shareholders,” he said.