KEFI Gold & Copper (KEFI) is re-commencing development at the Tulu Kapi gold project in Ethiopia.
The suspension, imposed on 7 September 2026 following what has come to be known as “the Genji Incident”, has been lifted after detailed reviews and consultations.
The Genji Incident took place on 4 September 2026 and was the first occasion when any KEFI personnel had suffered injury, let alone a fatality, in 12 years of KEFI’s control of the project.
The incident was concluded on 10 September 2026, largely as a result of close collaboration with the local community.
Since then, the company’s senior management and its local management team have held detailed consultations with community representatives, the leaders at all levels of the Ethiopian and Oromia Governments and their relevant agencies, along with other stakeholders in Ethiopia.
These discussions particularly focused on local community, localisation of operational activities and security arrangements.
As a result of these positive discussions, the company is now recommencing the development programme for Tulu Kapi in a phased and measured approach.
Construction is now recommencing for project electricity connections infrastructure. The process of construction new roads will also get underway.
This will be followed by replacing housing and lands for community resettling from the mining licence area.
This in turn will then allow the initial construction on the mining licence area, including installation of planned security infrastructure, bulk earthworks, and construction of the permanent accommodation facilities for the workforce.
“We are enjoying huge support from all stakeholders and are now restarting development with a phased and measured approach in which we reinforce the emphasis on safety and community benefits,” said Harry Anagnostaras-Adams, executive chairman of KEFI Gold and Copper.
“If in production today, the Tulu Kapi gold project would be directly employing approximately 1,000 people from the local community and have provided new roads, electricity connection, education and health facilities along with new local industry which will have been catalysed to provide the large production operation with food and other supplies. We are also very keen to explore for expansion of gold reserves to extend production as far as possible into the long term. We have already invested well over US$150 million, and our commitment is, and has always been, to be excellent corporate citizens for the long term. Our social and environmental plans are set to the highest international and local standards. Our environmental and social impact assessment has been on the company’s website for many years and we welcome enquiries from all stakeholders. The company is and will always remain strictly non-political and will also now refresh and intensify briefings to the community, in particular to avoid any confusion and maximise alignment.”
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KEFI says that its lenders have remained supportive throughout the suspension, which is just as well since it was a complex process to bring the financing package together. Be that as it may, the company has been well cushioned financially and with this restart getting underway relatively soon after the event in question, the overall impact on the development economics could very well be kept to a minimum. It is good to see that KEFI is liaising so closely with those on the ground, in terms both of communities and government representatives. In the meantime, the economics of Tulu Kapi remain compelling, even with the gold price swinging around as it has done of late.