The train of announcements paints a picture of steady progress,...

The train of announcements paints a picture of steady progress, awarding contracts, committing expenditure and most importantly on budget. Furthermore there was no intention to increase the initial output as of Feb 2020.

17 October. $140M awarded
3 December. $200M committed. On budget. Access to $176M finance, $72M raised previous August.
9 December. Financial close and well over 100 CP's ticked off.
Feb 2020. $216M initial capital cost, 90Ktpa initial output.

Now we hear rumour of $55M raise? The amount of liner that may have been trashed is insufficient to account for such a blowout.
The largest contract ($60M) is with Germans but the exchange rate hasn't moved that much.

If the reason for the suspension could be seen as positive then there would be some sort of explanation by now. For example if they decided to increase output, add capabilities for Magnesium, add a MOP converter etc. But no explanation leads one to think that someone/some contractor has got their sums wrongs somewhere or something isn't working out as planned.
Assuming the $102M credit from Germany and $74M from NAIF still stands, the alleged additional $55M is a very substantial blowout.
Are we now looking at $260M for 90Ktpa? Even at 180Ktpa it's a very expensive project.