About

Board of Directors

Ollie Oliveira

Non-Executive Chairman

Ollie Oliveira is a Chartered Accountant and economist and has over 40 years of strategic and operating experience in corporate finance and strategy, mainly in the mining sector. Taking early retirement in 2008, he spent the next nine years running his own consultancy as a corporate strategy advisor and private equity advisor and co-investor. Ollie has substantial international quoted company experience having been an executive director of companies quoted in Switzerland and South Africa and a non-executive director of companies listed on the TSX, NYSE and Hong Kong stock exchanges. He has chaired or been a member of Board committees covering the whole spectrum of governance bodies. He is presently Lead Independent Director of Vale SA.

Leon Coetzer

Chief Executive Officer

A qualified chemical engineer, Mr. Coetzer was with Anglo American Plc for 20 years, 16 of which with Anglo Platinum where he held various technical and operational managerial roles. A member of the advisory board of process engineering faculties at University of Pretoria.

Dr Mathews Phosa

Non-executive Vice-Chairman

Dr Mathews Phosa is a prominent legal, political and business leader in South Africa. He opened the first black law practice in Nelspruit in 1981 and was appointed as the first Premier of Mpumalanga – one of nine provinces established in 1994. He resigned his seat in parliament in 1999 to enter a career in business, although returned to politics to serve as Treasurer-General of the National Executive Committee of the ANC between 2007 and 2012. Dr Phosa received the inaugural Fellow of Stadio lifetime award from Stadio on 13 April 2022. He sits on the boards of a number of prominent South African institutions and companies, including Innibos, the Afrikaanse Handelsinstituut, Special Olympics South Africa, Value Group, Phosa Loots Inc Attorneys, Merensky Timber, Phosa Legacy Group, Frans Schutte & Mathews Phosa Inc. and Rubic Consortium (a company established to produce cost effective vaccines in South Africa, the Continent and globally) to name a few. Dr Phosa is a prolific author who speaks nine languages and has two anthologies in Afrikaans poetry to his name under the title “Deur die oog van ‘n naald” – some of which have been prescribed in the school curriculum for our national matric syllabus. Dr Phosa launched an English anthology called “Chants of Freedom” on 2 June 2015. Dr Phosa is currently writing two books on the history of South Africa.

Bertus van der Merwe

Chief Operations Officer

A qualified metallurgist with career spanning across operational, technical and business optimization.  These included Chief Operating Officer at one of the world’s leading chrome and ferrochrome entities and later Chief Executive Officer of an international ferrochrome company.  In his career he was regularly called upon to design and lead the implementation of turn around strategies and business optimisation programmes.

Christopher Molefe

Non-Executive Director

Christopher Molefe has over 20 years’ experience in the South African banking and mining industries. He began his career as Group Human Resources Manager at Union Carbide Africa Corporation after which he moved to Royal Bafokeng Resources where he served as Chief Executive. He has served as director of Transfrontier Capital Proprietary and Sabicor Proprietary and is currently on the boards of a number of South African corporates.

Neal Reynolds

Chief Financial Officer

A Chartered Accountant (South Africa) with a postgraduate qualification in Leadership Development,  Neal holds more than 14 years of experience in mostly African focused mining and metals operations.  He was most recently Chief Operational Officer at Chemaf, an established copper and cobalt producer in the Democratic Republic of the Congo. He began his career at Deloitte & Touche and in 2009 moved to Pan African Resources Plc.  In 2019, he was appointed CFO of Mopani Copper Mines and later became CFO of Glencore Copper Africa.

Leon Coetzer

Chief Executive Officer

Leon Coetzer is a qualified chemical engineer with more than 30 years’ experience in the mining and mineral processing sectors. He enjoyed a long, successful career with the Anglo-American Plc Group where he was responsible for managing both technical and production units of large operations, including both platinum concentrators and smelters. Leon was appointed Chief Executive Officer of Braemore Resources in 2008, which was responsible for the commercialisation of the patented ConRoast pyro- metallurgical process. Leon oversaw the acquisition of Braemore by Jubilee Metals Group Plc (formerly Jubilee Platinum Plc) and was appointed Chief Executive Officer of Jubilee in 2010.

Pedja Kovacevic

Chief of Strategy and Advisory

Mr. Kovacevic has a Masters Degree in Economics and a Postgraduate Diploma in Management and Business Administration. He is a corporate finance expert, with over 20 years of broad international experience He held a number of senior positions in both public and private sectors in markets across Europe and Africa, including VP Head of Banking at Duff & Phelps Africa and Director Financial Advisory Services at Deloitte Central Europe. Prior to joining Jubilee, he was the Group CFO at Afarak Group Plc.

Dr Evan Kirby

Technical Director

Dr Evan Kirby is a metallurgist with extensive experience in the mining sector. His career started in the South African platinum sector and included management of process developments, plant expansions and new projects. In 1992, he moved to Australia and joined an engineering company, working in management and technical roles on local and international mining projects. In 2002, Evan established his consulting business, Metallurgical Management Services. He has worked as a consultant to a wide range of projects and has served on the boards of several Australian and UK listed companies.

Ricus Grimbeek

Chief Energy Metals

A Mining Engineer with more than 30 years of experience in the mining industry holding various executive management and technical roles with global mining houses. He has managed numerous operations and the implementation of projects, across various mining jurisdictions. He is also a board member of Makor Resources which focuses on the formalisation of small scale and artisanal miners in Africa

Tracey Kerr

Non-Executive Director

Tracey Kerr has had an extensive career in the mining industry at executive and board level. Her formative career was spent at Vale and BHP after which she moved to Anglo American Plc Group where she held a number of senior roles including Group Head of Exploration and Group Head of Sustainable Development and was accountable for safety, operational risk management and sustainable development across the organisation. Tracey currently serves as a Non-Executive Director at Hochschild Mining Plc, a precious metals mining company and at Weir Group Plc, a mining technology company.

Nicholas Taylor

Non-Executive Director

Nick Taylor has more than 30 years’ experience in financial accounting, banking, strategy and business development. Having qualified in the UK with Price Waterhouse as a Chartered Accountant, Nick spent over 20 years in investment banking, focusing principally on the mining and minerals sector, where he has significant experience of corporate transactions, particularly public and private M&A, capital raising and deal structuring. He is currently a business development and strategy consultant in the natural resources sector and is also involved in a start-up developing technologies to improve the environmental footprint of the mining and building materials sectors.

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