Political risk in countries may rise and fall, but the specific risk of betting on the wrong player in the wrong country will always supersede. Such is the case in Peru and Mantaro Silver (MSLV.v), a company that will not benefit from the improvement in Peru risk as it calms down after a fractious election. That’s because of the idiots in charge of this Vancouver pump job, built around the bubble reputation of P. T. Barnum PhD, but it’s not Quinton Hennigh’s fault this time as he’s in this case he’s just coattailing, the frontman face to attract the Twitter Morons. The main fool is CEO Chris Wilson, who didn’t even check the biographies of the people nominated for director until it was too late. Idiot CEO Wilson was offered Luis Saenz as his local Peruvian stuffed shirt director and didn’t check his background. Follow the bouncing ball, ladies and gents:
- Luis Saenz headed up Compañía Minera Quiruvilca, which until 2018 held the concession for the Quiruvilca silver mine in La Libertad (once owned by Pan American Silver).
- In 2018 CM Quiruvilca closed down operations at the mine, laid off all workers and walked away, but the company did so in the most disgusting way possible. Luis Saenz, as head of the company, made the decision to leave the mine without enacting any of the normal closure protocols. The company didn’t lift a finger on normal closure procedures, instead just walking away and leaving a polluting mess.
- How bad? Since 2018, the Moche River that runs down this valley looks like this:
- Why this long? Because another thing Luis Saenz has done is to prevent any remediation work from being done, even if he and his company don’t pay for it. Due to the laws in Peru, the national government was not allowed to enter and do work on this private property and stop the massive, daily and ongoing contamination of heavy metals from entering the river and local water supply.
- The situation is so ridiculous that Peru has had to pass a new law in order to do something about Quiruvilca. This week, after the urging of the locals finally got traction, Peru’s Congress finally voted up a law project that now allows the State to intervene in environmental emergencies of this nature, on private property with disgusting, immoral and vomitworthy owners.
- And now, finally, Quiruvilca will get its decent and necessary closure. And the new Pedro Castillo government is fully aware of the issue and the bad actors behind it, because they met with the President-Elect earlier this month.
- Bottom line: A junior mining company represented by the very same man who was the direct cause of all this mess is now applying for permits to the new Castillo government to go exploring and drilling.
Guess which exploreco you must NOT own in Peru? Yup, you got it, the idiot Wilson’s junior. You have been warned.
Let’s say I’m a BC venture capitalist. As long as the Castillo government doesn’t take action against Mantaro, why should I care how the execs chose to put out their last dumpster fire? All I’m concerned about is how little the next fool investor knows about corporate indiscretions.
Indeed. Our insightful BCVC might then proceed to investigate ways of quietening any dissenting voices that dare shine light on said mishaps and indiscretions. It’s strictly business, nothing personal.