Centamin Picks Toro Gold Founder Martin Horgan As New CEO

(Alliance News) - Gold miner Centamin PLC has chosen former Toro Gold Ltd boss Martin Horgan as its new chief executive, the company announced on Thursday.

Horgan joins on Monday next week. He co-founded Toro and led the firm between 2009 and last year.

Toro developed the Mako gold mine in Senegal and was taken over by London-listed gold miner Resolute Mining Ltd last August in a USD274 million deal.

Prior to Toro, Horgan worked at former London-listed diamond miner BDI Mining, now part of Gem Diamonds Ltd, and spent time in mining finance at Barclays PLC. He began his career as a mining engineer at South Africa's Gold Fields Ltd.

Centamin's current interim CEO Ross Jerrard will revert back to his previous role of chief financial officer.

Chair Josef El-Raghy commented: "Appointing someone of Martin's calibre follows an intensive international search process and will enable Centamin to move forward with confidence. Martin brings not only excellent technical, commercial and financial experience but also strong operational and leadership skills which he demonstrated as CEO at Toro Gold.

"Combined with his deep knowledge and understanding of gold mining across Africa, we believe that he will make an invaluable contribution to the company. On behalf of the board, I would like to thank Ross for his commitment and professionalism in taking on the role as interim CEO. Ross has provided excellent leadership, keeping Centamin focused during challenging circumstances, as we navigated an unsolicited corporate approach and the ongoing coronavirus pandemic."

Centamin's former CEO Andrew Pardey left last December amid operational problems at Centamin's only producing mine, Sukari in Egypt, with the company missing production targets on several occasions during 2019.

Centamin also had been dealing with a hostile merger proposal by Canada's Endeavour Mining Corp, which put forward a GBP1.47 billion proposal which would have given Centamin shareholders 47% of the combined entity.

However, talks were abandoned in January after the two were unable to come to terms.

Centamin shares were 1.1% higher on Thursday morning in London at 120.17 pence each.

By George Collard; georgecollard@alliancenews.com

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