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| Sam Jonah Quits AngloGold Ashanti |
2/14/2007 |
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Wednesday, 14 February 2007
Dr. Sam Esson Jonah, who formerly headed Ashanti Goldfields Company has resigned from the AngloGold Ashanti board with immediate effect, AngloGold Ashanti announced yesterday. He has since been replaced by Sipho Pityana, appointed to the AngloGold Ashanti board with effect from 13 February 2007.
Sipho Pityana is the Executive Chairman of Izingwe Holdings (Proprietary) Limited and has occupied strategic roles in both the public and private sectors and is currently a non-executive director of several companies including Bytes Technology Group (BTG), African Oxygen (Afrox), Munich Re and Aberdare Cables. Mr Jonah is credited with the successful merger between Ghana’s Ashanti Goldfields and South African mining giant Anglogold, culminating in Anglogold Ashanti.
He was then Chief Executive Officer of Ashanti Goldfields and soon after the merger was made President and board member of the new company until his resignation as board member. Two Ghanaians; Messrs E.R. Bannerman and J.H. Mensah remain board members of Anglogold Ashanti. Sam Jonah earned an Associateship (ACSM) in Mining Engineering at the Camborne School of Mines in Cornwall, England and subsequently completed an MSc in Mine Management at the Imperial College of Science and Technology in London.
He rejoined Ashanti Goldfields Corporation in 1979, working in various capacities, including underground operations, and eventually became the Chief Executive Officer at the age of 36. As Chief Executive of Ashanti Goldfields, Sam Jonah supervised the transformation of Ashanti Goldfields into a mining multinational, increased gold production from 240,000 ounces per annum to over 1.6 million ounces in over ten years, and oversaw the company''s listing as the first operating African company on the New York Stock Exchange.
Also the Chancellor of the University of Cape Coast, Mr. Jonah served on various boards including Lonmin, the Commonwealth African Investment Fund (Comafin), the Advisory Council of the UN Secretary General''s Global Compact, President Thabo Mbeki''s International Investment Advisory Council of South Africa, First Atlantic Merchant Bank, Defiance Mining, and President John Kufuor''s Ghana Investors'' Advisory Council. As well as his directorships, Mr Jonah served as a member of the Advisory Board of the London Business School.
He has been decorated with several awards and honours, among them an honorary Doctor of Science (D.Sc) degree awarded jointly by the Camborne School of Mines and the University of Exeter (UK) in 1996. Her Majesty, Queen Elizabeth II, Head of the Commonwealth, conferred on Sam Jonah an Honorary Knighthood, presented by the Prince of Wales, at a ceremony in June, 2003. The award was in recognition of Dr. Jonah''s exceptional achievements as an African businessman, a leading business executive from the Commonwealth, and an international public figure.
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