EXPLORATION 1997 — Kinbauri increases stake in Soukoura

Now that it fully owns the Soukoura polymetallic property in Burkina Faso, Kinbauri Gold (KNBR-C) is planning an aggressive program of exploration.

The company recently acquired a 50% back-in interest held by Banfora Mines, a privately held Quebec company, in exchange for 100,000 company shares. As a result, the junior now holds an unencumbered 100% interest in the 478-sq.-km property and, in the next few months, will begin a program of prospecting, mapping, soil geochemistry and trenching.

The program will test several gold-in-soil anomalies and one base metal soil anomaly on the northwestern portion of the property, which were identified by the company in 1996 through regional reconnaissance work.

The gold anomalies overlie a sequence of north-south-trending, felsic meta tuffs and volcanic rocks (quartz-sericite schists) with cherty and manganiferous exhalites (15-20% manganese), which frequently trend northeasterly, parallel to regional fault zones and quartz-veining. Grab samples from surface outcrops have yielded between 1 and 4 grams gold per tonne; the gold mineralization is associated with quartz, quartz-carbonate and silicified zones in sericite schist.

The base metal (copper-lead-zinc) overlies a sericite schist on the flank of maganiferous exhalites. The surface geology and soil geochemistry are said to be similar to the country’s only massive sulphide deposit, Perkoa, about 250 km to the northeast.

Following the surface program, the company plans to begin a 2,000-metre program of reverse-circulation drilling.