Mr. Kenny: Firestone Diamonds is a diamond exploration and mining company. Firestone has been involved in the diamonds business since 1994, but the background to our company actually goes back a lot further than that. My father, Jim Kenny, who is Chairman of Firestone, and I have been involved in the natural resources sector for over 20 years. We saw an opportunity to get involved in South Africa in 1994, when the first democratic elections took place and the ANC Government came to power. As you may know, the sanctions which had been in place against South Africa during the years of apartheid had resulted in little or no foreign investment coming into South Africa. So, unlike countries like Australia, Canada, and the US where there were many junior companies exploring for gold, base metals, diamonds, etc. there had been very little junior exploration activity in South Africa. We took the view that not only would the diamonds business be a good business to get into, but that that was a good time to start looking at South Africa. In 1994, we entered into a partnership with a private South African company that had been involved in the diamonds business for close to 40 years, and which was run by a geologist called Hugh Jenner-Clarke. Hugh has an exceptional track record and reputation - he has been involved in the discovery of four mines to date - and a lot of experience, and at the time was looking for people to back new projects that he wanted to pursue. We agreed to back him, and have now been working together for just over six years, with Hugh now acting as our Technical Director and Deputy Chairman.
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