David Lenigas, Australian chief executive of Lonrho Africa, is on the verge of clinching a ‘really big’ uranium deal in South Africa as the first step in his drive to build the African trading house into a group with a £1 billion balance sheet. In the saddle since December, Lenigas, a director of Asia Energy and other companies in the entrepreneurial Cambrian Mining stable, is out to restore Lonrho Africa to the heady position it held when controversial tycoon Tiny Rowland ran the show.

The present company, now valued on AIM at a modest £34.25 million, was created after the Rowland era, when its platinum mining interests were separated into Lonmin and Lonrho Africa held a ragbag of other African operations, such as motor dealerships, hotels and energy. Lenigas, who says the company has £20 million cash ‘and access to plenty more’, is keen to expand its hotel and oil and gas activities and is scathing about the former management’s sale of Lonrho’s Toyota franchise ‘for only $3 million [£1.76 million]’.

The company, which has recruited Ambrian Partners mining analyst Emma Priestley to the board, is ‘going to make a big kick-off in resources’, stresses Lenigas. The shares, strong at 21.75p, should have further to go.