I attended the meeting.  Most of the directors were there, Sean...

I attended the meeting.  Most of the directors were there, Sean freeman was there,  Dave mendelawitz was there.  Dr Nik the new director was absent I guess he is based in Delhi.

Peter Richards ran the meeting, respectfully gave time for all of us to ask questions and they were respectfully answered by  Peter, Dave, Sean Henbury and the new ex-santos director (Ray).   I asked plenty of questions relating to my letter sent out and the protest vote against the resolutions.  Most of my questions were about Dave and why he should get so many performance rights and his history at Cleveland mining.   I asked why he ended with $30,000,000 on paper at its high point in Cleveland mining, was he getting loads of incentives and rights for that company too and sounds like he was.   

Sean Henbury reckons we don't have to worry about Dave getting 30 million shares (13% of the company) because that is an extreme scenario and not going to happen.  For some reason or other they had to frame it like that to meet ASX requirements.  They also say there is nothing to worry about with the first Samuel loan ie FS are not going to end up with half the company, because they do not expect the share price to stay this low.   If Mendelawitz meets any targets then the share price will be high they reckon.  

If the directors are to be believed the company is in the right place at the right time still, there is huge demand and in three years time the share price will be much higher.   If things are so good it makes me wonder why the generous loan repayment to First Samuel for being a high risk loan was necessary because it doesn't sound that risky at all.   

Lets see if what they say turns out to be right. 

They couldn't give exact timings for things although they say they are hoping for 1h 2019 commissioning (I think),  and then they would be running 24/7.  Ray was explaining where stage 3 is at now, I think he was saying the foundations are being laid and the next six months is brilliant building weather.  Essar is organising site managers, supervisors and general managers and I think they are employed now.  They couldn't give cost/tonne or margin/tonne.  Must admit I wasn't listening as carefully as I should have.  Maybe someone else who attended can say about that stuff.

They scraped over the line with the first Samuel loan with 15 million (+2 million chairman directed proxies) for and 10 million against.  After the meeting finished I got a call from a top 5 holder who only got my letter today and he wanted to vote against with 7 million votes.  Had that gone through it would have been a close call and it would have tested the honesty system where the company secretary is recording our votes!

It was also a substantial protest vote against Daves incentive shares, if you take out First Samuels 40 million votes it was 17 million for and 13 million against  plus the 7 million against from the caller today.   Definitely retail shareholders are against the loan and the incentives.   

Thanks all who voted.