RHA Tungsten Project Exploration Update Zimbabwe

PREMIER AFRICAN MINERALS LTD - RHA Tungsten Project Exploration Update Zimbabwe

PR Newswire

London, April 16

Premier African Minerals Limited / Ticker: PREM / Index: AIM / Sector: Mining

17 April 2013

Premier African Minerals Limited (`Premier' or `the Company')

New near surface, high grade tungsten mineralised quartz veins identified at

Premier African Minerals Limited, the AIM quoted multi-commodity naturalresource company with mineral projects located in Western and Southern Africa,announces a further positive exploration update at its flagship RHA TungstenProject, located in the prospective Kamativi Tin Belt in north-west Zimbabwe(`RHA' or `the Project'). The Company believes that the Project has thepotential to be developed into a low capital and operating cost tungsten minein the near term.

The announcement made on 18 February 2013 reported assay results from asampling programme where the entire core from each of the boreholes was splitinto 3 m long samples of core. The most recent sample programme (that reportedhere) focussed on careful and detailed sample collection respecting changes ingeology and in particular sampling of the mineralised quartz veins.

Overview

Exploration Update

Premier commenced a 1,302 m diamond drilling (`DD') programme in January 2012,which consisted of five holes (DD002 - DD006) inclined at -45 degrees. In aninitial round of sampling, a quarter of core was sampled over 3 m intervals forthe full length of each borehole and analysed for WO3, copper (`Cu'), tin(`Sn') and tantalum (`Ta') at the SGS laboratories in Johannesburg.

The positive results received from the first round of sampling (see pressrelease 18 February 2013) prompted Premier to conduct a further detailedlogging and sampling of the drill core during Q4 2012. Intervals where assayresults returned tungsten values over 0.15% WO3 were the primary target of thiscampaign. 198 samples were taken excluding blanks, duplicates and CertifiedReference Materials. The relative density of each sample has been determined bymeans of a Density Scale.

These results further confirm the presence of numerous quartz veins that arehighly mineralised with tungsten wolframite. Note: the widths reported areintersection widths and not the true widths. These results are tabulated below.

Veins B,C,D,E,F and G fall within a newly identified lode, while the deeperH,I,J and K veins fall within the known strike extension of Lodes 6 and 7.Veins B to G are of potential economic interest and further work is planned toexplore them.

Vein From(m) To(m) Width (m_ W(%) WO3(%) WO3 (kg/t)

Veins A to H fall within the strike extension to the east of Veins B to F inDD003. These veins are also of potential economic interest.

Veins B to F fall on the strike extension of veins noted in boreholes 2 and 3above and are potentially of economic interest. Vein A is located on thehanging wall; its correlation with other veins is not certain.

This sequence of veins marks a series of vein intersections through the depthextensions of the known lodes that were mined historically at RHA. The veins'economic significance will become clearer when Premier update the 3D Dataminemodel, which is currently being constructed.

These vein intersections confirm the existence of previously unrecognised highgrade veins in the hanging wall of the known lode mineralisation. The surfaceexpression of these veins is the subject of a targeted trenching programme thatis currently underway.

Importantly, the detailed geological logging has revealed that the tungstenmineralisation is in the form of very coarse wolframite crystals, hosted withinnarrow quartz veins. These veins are between 5 cm and 30 cm in width and withfew exceptions are hosted within quartz-tourmaline schist bands that make upthe known lodes.

Techno-economic study

Premier has commissioned mining consultants, CAE Mining of Johannesburg toconstruct a 3D Datamine model using information derived from historic plans andsections, and the results of the historic Falconbridge channel sampling workundertaken at RHA. This work is now at an advanced stage and the results ofPremier's first round of sampling have been modelled. The analytical resultsfrom Premier's latest round of detailed sampling will be evaluated and includedinto the 3D Datamine model. The completed model will be used as the basis for aconcept mine technical and economic study which the Company has commenced.

Further Information on RHA

Premier's RHA project covers 1,800 ha land holding and is located approximately20 km south-east of Hwange and 270 km north of Bulawayo in the prospectivemulti-commodity Kamativi Tin Belt in north-west Zimbabwe. The Project hasexcellent infrastructure with electrical power available from a ZESA powerline, industrial water available from the mine dam and domestic water availablefrom a borehole. Furthermore, the project has easy access via the mainBulawayo-Victoria Falls tar road and 25 km of gravel road to the mine.

Intermittent small scale mining has been conducted at RHA and the adjacent Tungmine (which Premier has an option to acquire) 5 km away. Between 1931 and 1979the mines jointly produced 1,247 tonnes of wolframite concentrate at an averageconcentrate grade of 65% WO3.

RHA occupies a low ridge approximately 850 m long and 300 m wide standing about120 m above its surroundings. Historic mine workings are in the form of adits,open pits, caved stopes, trenches, roads and rock dumps that occupy thesurface. Tailings dumps are located on the north and south sides of the ridge.

Previous mine development was almost entirely carried out during the 1930swhere the mine was developed on 30 m levels from 945 m to 845 m, by means ofhorizontal adits into the sides of the ridge and a single vertical shaft downto the 845 m level. Some open pitting also occurred on the western part of thedeposit.

During the mid to late 1970s Falconbridge Ltd (which is now part of Xstrata),trading as Blanket Mines in Zimbabwe, carried out underground geologicalmapping and extensive channel sampling on the accessible parts of theunderground workings, principally on the 926, 895 and 859 levels. Explorationwork was curtailed due to the political and security situation prevailing inthe country at that time.

At RHA, the known mineralised lodes and veins occur within an envelope thatextends over a strike of approximately 400 m with a maximum width of 150 m. Thelodes are thought to converge to the east of the property. The lodes strikeapproximately northeast-southwest paralleling the regional trend of KamativiInlier. The host country-rock comprises high-grade, strongly foliated biotiteschists and paragneisses of the Precambrian Dete Inlier belonging to theTshontada Formation. The formation trends northeast on a regional scale,paralleling the trend of the Kamativi Inlier, and dips steeply to thenorthwest.

The tungsten mineralisation occurs in quartz veins and shear zones, within asequence of quartz-tourmaline and pelitic schists that may be associated withgranite intrusions. High metamorphic grades with localised partial melting arealso evident. The schists also show that extreme deformation has occurred andmylonite bands are common. The association of quartz veins with tourmalineschists form distinct lodes which were exploited by historic mining at RHA.These lodes are steeply dipping to the northwest at 80o to90o. Seven lodes wereexploited in the past.

The tungsten mineral of primary economic interest is wolframite (Fe,MnWO4),with minor amounts of scheelite (CaWO4). The only other mineral of possibleeconomic significance is chalcopyrite (CuFeS2). The wolframite occurs aseuhedral crystals, laths and clusters that may be up to 50 mm by 30 mm in size.This very coarse grain size is characteristic of the quartz vein-hostedtungsten mineralisation.

Qualified Person

The technical information contained in this announcement has been prepared andreviewed by Robert Ingram BSc, C.Eng., Pr.Nat.Sci., FGSSA, MSEG, and ProfessorAlexander du Plessis PrEng, BSc(Eng), MSc(Eng), CertEng, FSAIMM, who are theappointed consultants to Premier African Minerals Limited. Mr Ingram isregistered with The South African Counsil for Natural Scientific Professions(SACNASP) Registration Number 400057/92, and Professor du Plessis with theEngineering Council of South Africa (ECSA) Registration Number 950232. They aresatisfied with the accuracy and precision of this release by Premier AfricanMinerals Limited.

Zulu Project option

Premier exercised its option to acquire the Zulu Project prior to Admission on10 December 2012 and intended to complete this transaction shortly thereafter.Background on the transaction is included in the Admission Document. Completionhas been delayed for technical reasons but once these have been resolved thetransaction will proceed. Shareholders will be updated in due course.

Premier African Minerals Limited is a multi-commodity exploration anddevelopment company focussed in Southern and West Africa. The Company has adiverse portfolio of multi-commodity projects which includes tungsten,phosphate, rare earth elements (`REE'), gold, lithium, tantalum, uranium andclays, in Zimbabwe and Togo, at various stages of development. Premier plans toutilise the strengths of its proven Board and management team, which is highlyexperienced in developing resource projects in Africa, to fulfil its strategyof developing and targeting projects which offer near term value uplift eitherthrough exploration, strategic alliances or commercial opportunities.

The Company has two flagship projects in NW Zimbabwe (tungsten and REE) whichoffer near-term resource and future production potential. The RHA TungstenProject is described herein, and Premier's second priority project in Zimbabweis the Katete REE project, which again has the potential to be developed as anopen pit mine. The project, which spans 3,750 ha, has returned a peak resultfrom trenching of 14.6% TREO. Premier is targeting to delineate aCode-compliant resource statement in H1 2013.

In Togo, the Company has prioritised a further two projects for exploration:the Southern Togo Phosphate Project and the Dapaong Gold project. The SouthernTogo project, which has excellent infrastructure being only 35km from the Portof Lome, has a conceptual exploration target of 75Mt at 32% P₂O₅. Additionally,it recently secured the exploration permits for its Dapaong gold project innorthern Togo where there has been significant artisanal activity illustratingthe prospectivity of the unexplored area.

Premier also has a pipeline portfolio of projects which further de-risks theCompany's exposure and it is assessing new opportunities that complement itsinvestment criteria to drive the Company forward and build a leadingmulti-commodity exploration and development company in Africa.