(Alliance News) - Aura Energy Ltd said Tuesday that John Bennett has been elected as a director to the board of the company during the extraordinary general meeting on Monday.
Aura Energy said the board, as constituted prior to the election of Bennett, is "extremely concerned at this development".
In October, the Australia-based uranium explorer had received a notice from its shareholder Pre Emptive Trading Pty Ltd to call a general meeting in order to propose the immediate removal of the company's Chair Peter Reeve and cancel his 17.5 million performance shares.
Pre Emptive Trading, which holds 5.89% stake in Aura, had also proposed the appointment of John Bennett as non-executive director.
On December 19, Aura Energy had said it had written to the Australian Securities & Investments Commission in a bid to delay a shareholder meeting requisitioned by Pre-Emptive Trading.
Aura Energy repeated its view that Bennett should not be appointed as a non-executive director as it believes Pre-Emptive Trading is in breach of contact for failing to take up shares it agreed to subscribe for in the company’s placement that completed back in February.
As a result, Aura Energy had brought action against Pre-Emptive Trading for the recovery of USD456,000 in damages.
Aura Energy had also said it did not believe Bennett has the experience necessary to act as a director of the company nor the appropriate skills in governance, debt & equity markets and reporting.
In an extraordinary general meeting on Monday, the vote to appoint Bennett as a director was passed by a "slim margin" of approximately 33.4 million shares, representing approximately 2% of the issued capital, the company said.
"The Aura Board today resolved, given the unprecedented situation of having ongoing litigation against a subsequently- elected director, to assess, with the appropriate legal advice, the degree to which Bennett can be included in the company's activities and the degree to which information can be released to him," the company said.
"At this stage the board believes that this will be very limited until the litigation has been resolved," Aura Energy noted.
Aura Energy shares were down 9.8% in London at 0.23 pence each on Tuesday.
By Loreta Juodagalvyte; loretajuodagalvyte@alliancenews.com
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Aura Egy (AURA)