Lake Victoria Gold Formalizes Tanzanian-Led EPCM Team, Advancing the Fully Permitted Imwelo Gold Project Toward Construction
Lake Victoria Gold Ltd. (LVG) announced the formal appointment of City Engineering Company Ltd. (CECL) as the primary EPCM contractor and Sutton Consulting International Limited as the technical support partner for its Imwelo Gold Project in Tanzania. This appointment follows approval from the Mining Commission on June 29, 2026. The structure aligns with Tanzania's Mining (Local Content) Regulations, 2018, with CECL acting as the qualifying Indigenous Tanzanian Company (ITC).
CECL is a 100% Tanzanian-owned engineering and environmental services company, while Sutton provides international technical review and African mine-development experience. The scope of work consolidates engineering and development workstreams, including final detailed engineering, procurement planning, infrastructure design, mine planning support, construction preparation, and project management. Specific workstreams include tailings and water infrastructure design, geotechnical and hydrogeological studies, process plant optimization, procurement support, and construction quality assurance.
Simultaneously, the company closed the third and final tranche of its non-brokered private placement of unsecured convertible debentures, raising $331,000. This brings the total aggregate proceeds to $4,165,200 across all three tranches. The debentures carry an interest rate of 5% per annum and mature 36 months from issuance, with a conversion price of $0.30 per share. Investors in the final tranche received warrants to purchase 551,666 common shares at $0.40 per share for 36 months. In total, 6,941,990 warrants were issued across the entire private placement. No finder's fees were paid in connection with the final tranche. The securities are subject to a four-month-and-one-day statutory hold period under Canadian securities laws and remain subject to final approval of the TSX Venture Exchange.
Proceeds will support ongoing development activities at Imwelo, including engineering, mine planning, infrastructure preparation, and active field programs. The company also noted that a previously announced term sheet for a gold loan facility of up to approximately US$25 million with Monetary Metals & Co. remains subject to conditions and regulatory approvals. Imwelo is a fully permitted gold project, and the company is advancing toward a construction decision.
Marc Cernovitch, President & CEO, stated: "This is a key milestone in preparing Imwelo for construction. With Mining Commission approval received and our EPCM structure now formalized, we have moved another important step closer to building one of Tanzania's next new gold mines. Equally important, we are advancing Imwelo the right way... CECL and Sutton give us the right platform to do that. CECL brings Tanzanian leadership, local engineering capability and in-country execution capacity, while Sutton adds specialist international technical support and African mine-development experience."