Thank you, Mark. I was asked by shareholders to make a special effort to allow people to turn up and meet us in person in London. And I am told today that I made a big mistake of inviting everybody on a Friday afternoon. So obviously, that didn't quite achieve that purpose. But thank you for those who did attend here today. And the attendance online, I appreciate, I've told it's a very large number.
The timing of this particular webinar also, I suppose it's fair to say it was quite deliberate because it's a bit challenging at times to have these sorts of sessions because it's not regulated and I'm not really meant to step outside the bounds of what's public information. And all I'm trying to do is, I suppose, help people understand public information. And therefore, I was quite deliberate in that sense that we should time it to be between the annual report, which is meant to be fairly fulsome update and the Annual General Meeting so that we're in a time window, if you like, where the market should be fairly well informed already and fully informed and to make it easier, if you like, to be expansive.
The other thing is that we did put out a presentation this morning, which I assume people have seen on the website. And of course, that gets checked by the regulatory system. So we've tried to be as up to date as possible just going into this webinar to make sure we're doing nothing improper.
On that note, I'll kick off very briefly with a skip through this presentation. I don't think you're here to steer at a presentation you've seen on our website, but I'll just skip through it and maybe I'll try to pick up some of the bits that I think are perhaps the most sensitive or critical nuances. Now obviously, shareholder -- at last count when we could work it out, there were 5,000 shareholders. And it's very difficult for shareholders to try to read into the nuances of what's going on behind the scenes, and I'll try to help.
The first thing to say is that about a year ago -- forgetting all the history up to a year ago, about a year ago, it started to pivot into an execution. And that's because the country had settled down. When I first arrived in Ethiopia 10 years ago, it was all implementation. We had to correct the technical plan, and it was all implementation. We had a bank lined up and we were going like textbook case, and then the country started changing very rapidly around us. And sort of with hindsight, we didn't foresee all the things that happened. But with hindsight, we lost a good 5 years realistically. And that turned -- about a year ago, it turned into an implementation plan.
And our achievement, whether we like it or not, it's just a fact was that the only thing we really achieved in those 5 last years is defend the company, not lose the license, not lose people on the ground and actually, we forged relationships with banks and government and contractors to the point where they were happy to stay with us because they saw how we behaved ourselves and they were comfortable that we would do nothing stupid. That's all we achieved. We didn't achieve value adding. We didn't achieve all the things we tried to achieve. With hindsight, we didn't. And a year ago, it turned. This is happening, sort of feeling.
And we -- it was all on the back of security being deployed. It was ready to be deployed. It couldn't be deployed. It was deployed heavily not because we are attacked, not because anybody who was against us other than underhanded people, you can meet in any country but because there are some risks out there that you've got to treat it as a red zone with, and we do.
Now what are the sensitive points on this? It's fair to say it's a criticism applied to me that some of the things I say are aspirational rather than factual. Well, when the things are changing around you all the time and you're actually shepherd shepherding 12 parties against the backdrop of political turmoil, yes, it's aspirational, and I don't know that anyone can get away from that fact. When you get into signed contracts, it's contractual, and that's what we're looking forward to now.
And the thing that really triggered this now into contractual is the parliamentary ratification in May. The world promised it, I don't know, December or January imminently, and we had to keep pushing and shoving and pushing and shoving and unfortunately, we don't control the parliament of the country, and it only came through in the middle of May. But that was the trigger.
On the back of that, we were able to trigger some of the certifications that you couldn't trigger before then. If you trigger them before then, you could run out of puff because they only last so long. So that was the key that triggered the sequencing of contract closing. That means that we are now today all planning closing. That's what we're doing. And the documents are assembled. They have to be polished.
Most costing updates are done, but the plant one because it's fixed price lump sum is going to take into July now because we only triggered it after the ratification. But it's all systems go in the sense of setting up to sign the contracts. Everyone is getting greedy and running their commissions and work and the contractors need to mobilize their staff, they need to assign labor. I mean it's now getting to the stage of everyone having to plan their human and capital resources to be assigned to this assignment now.
Do I work this? I know I took way too long on that first one, but I thought that was perhaps worthwhile because the frustration that I feel all the time from shareholders saying, why the hell can't you sign it and get on with it? Why can't -- if you sign on one day, why can't you draw down the next day and all this sort of stuff. There's $1 billion of contracting being done here and if shareholders put up the money and did all the work, they could call the shots.
But the reality is we're not in that business. We're in the business of commandeering the capital and commandeering the contractors to make those commitments for us. So unfortunately, we don't just boss everybody around every day, we corral them. Now as soon as they sign the contracts, it's different because they're on the hook contractually with liabilities if they don't perform.
Field activities this quarter. If you just scan your eye over that, I won't dwell on anything but it's obviously being prepared for launch. There's construction of security camps and construction camps and so on.
Next one, please. This isn't a new slide, but the points of sensitivity are nothing to do with the first $320 million, but all to do with are we going to issue shares for $5 million or $10 million or something like that. That's all that I hear about from shareholders, nothing to do with how the hell do you raise $315 million. It's all to do with do we really have to put up $5 million.
Well, I don't want to sound in any way arrogant, but the reality is what percentage of $320 million is $5 million? What is that? About 1.5%? So shareholders need to understand this is a mining contract in Ethiopia and a 1.5% variance on budget is not outside the realms of possibility. I'm not saying it will be. I'm not saying -- I'm not promising or guaranteeing anything. I'm just trying to be realistic here.
You are investing as shareholders in a preproduction company in a frontier market in the first bankable deal in the country. And really, are you intolerant of a 1.5% variance on budget? I mean I'm saying that seriously with all respect, but I don't hear from 5,000 shareholders. I usually only hear from a handful. But I do make the point, I'm just trying to be common sense reasonable in this industry in the context of what we're doing. I think we've done -- well, I don't know anybody who's done this before. I don't know anyone who in London has raised so much capital without reliance on shareholders. I don't know, although I'm happy to be corrected.
Next one, please. The closing process, what should I highlight here? What worries me about the closing process? I've made the point of in the last few days talking to the owner of the mining contractor and boss of the mining contractor, the Group Managing Director of the construction contractor, the lead banker, the minister in Ethiopia, just to make sure that I'm not missing anything. I've done that very deliberately. And everyone is pushing so hard, the anxiety, the tension.
But what I would say is that it's a normal thing. Anxiety and tension when you're in the home stretch is perfectly normal. And the important thing is to focus it on positive delivery closing, not on taking shots at each other if we're all on the same side. It's happening. And we all just have to man up to it and deal with it and close. And that's what we're doing.
And what's worrying me? Apart from just the general era of turning energy into positive energy and closing, I think we've got a first-class structure, which is why the banks stuck with us. The way we've structured the contracts and surrounded this with first-class people, you don't -- you talk to me, but you don't see the first-class team we've got on the ground, very experienced.
It's the social side and the politics because everything else is perfectly controllable. And the social side is now not an uncontrollable thing. What I can say is that their excitement, imagine being people who lived in the same land on the same land for millennia, not 20 years, but millennia, and crossing the bridge mentally to be removed and shifted. Imagine being in that position. Well, they just want to get on with it now. They're sick of hearing about it. And so we need to manage that extremely carefully. So that I'm not perturbed by anything that's said or done, but that's -- I'm really concerned about doing that properly, and we will.
And the politics of the country is so palpably driven to get this job on the road that we're under intense pressure, beaten up relentlessly by the politicians to get this started. But we will insist on all the Is dotted and all the Ts crossed and all the documentation before we press the button. And I could tell you stories about people who just get cajoled into proceeding without getting everything properly tided, and we will do it properly. But they're good pressures. They're not bad pressures. They just have to be dealt with properly.
The structure in Ethiopia is there's a new holding company being incorporated down in the country. I'm not sure is it already done, John? I don't -- yes. It's so that we can list down there for local investors to participate. One of our hallmarks, which I hope stands this company out over time and gives us more and more protection and more and more opportunity, is to be able to have local stakeholders, local owners involved in the structure. Having the government involved, I think, saved our bacon on the way through the last few years. And having the private sector involved through institutional investors, I think, will only reinforce that going forward.
And over on the left-hand, the Saudi side, we're doing the same thing to give us more flexibility in how we structure, either our remaining in Saudi or departure from Saudi, but it gives us more structure, more opportunity. I'll talk about that a bit more later.
Next slide, please. Yes, I could easily wax lyrical about the development opportunity in Ethiopia and the other things that we can do. And I will understand that as soon as we sign for construction, everyone's questions will immediately turn to what next. I well understand that. And there is a pipeline of things to address, but no one really wants to focus on them until we got this thing signed up, which is fair enough, and that's the way it should be.
But I think it's obvious that the first thing is the underground development. If this was a large mining group, we would be planning to develop the underground access immediately and to coproduce from underground as well as open pit immediately. It's not today's priority but that's obviously the first cab off the rank, and we'll address that as soon as it's reasonable to do so from a cost of capital viewpoint. And I've put in there a target of how we'll do it, but we'll do it when it makes sense.
And there are other things in the pipeline that we need to address. And this thing will start I think year 1 in the open pit will be about 160,000 ounces. You can -- and we start the mining at 2.5 million tonnes a year, the processing at only 2 million tonnes a year, so we can rev up the plant when we want to. But that's all to come, and we want to get this thing up to 200,000 ounces plus as soon as we can.
Next one, please. The Saudi pipeline, I was -- one of the questions said, which were pre-submitted questions, why didn't you sell it in December? Well, we only announced a 6-month review in November. And the question was why didn't you sell it in December? I don't think you could sell your house in 1 month, let alone a venture in Saudi Arabia. It put the spotlight on this, put pressure on this and the pressure yielded a lot of positive developments already, which we put our RNSs out on. And we do have some choices emerging, not on the table, emerging, and we need to work them out.
The partner, if I may quote because he says it to everybody he meets, is differential or respectful enough to say everything we've achieved will be achieved because of KEFI, and I'm really sad to hear them say they would be interested to sell out. And we're so close to being completely self-funding I don't understand it. That's the partner's words. And what he means by that, I think, is the Jibal Qutman analysis sort of being a gold -- fairly straightforward gold development where KEFI's development capital share might be as low as $5 million or something like that. And that triggers a whole self-funding exercise in the country and he's a bit bemused by the fact that KEFI doesn't have the wherewithal to just keep up with that. It's a bit weird to him. But we'll do what we have to do.
Next slide, please. This slide is a standard slide. It states the critical sort of carrot, if I can put it that way. If we have people who want to be part of this journey, people who stay in to be in this journey, the only reason they should be in such a high-risk journey is if the multiples of upside warrant it. And I think they do, notwithstanding the terrible dilution we've suffered just to survive. I think the multiples do warrant it and the multiples on what we have today, the pipelines are huge. And it doesn't take a lot of imagination to think of all sorts of ideas and possibilities, but they're good multiples.
Next slide, please. The Board -- well, the 2 executive directors are in the room, and I do admit that photo of mine is a bit flattering. It's a bit old and better updated. The other guys are all seasoned people. To be honest, you have to be a bit thick skin and seasoned to be in this game. And I'm not good enough to do it by remote controllers. If you think I sip martinis by the pool in Cyprus as my living, simply don't understand. I don't know why my wife and family have tolerated it, but I've barely seen them for years, but I'm not complaining.
And these nonexecutive directors, I've known them for up to about 5 years, I think, each of them. They're all very decent people. One has been an operator in the mining game all his life before he retired, Rich, Alistair has been an ESG specialist for the largest European development bank. And Addis is a director on a number of companies in Addis, basically protecting multinationals who operate in Addis, plus he has his own businesses. Next slide, please.
