By: OrePulse

Blencowe Resources, the London-listed miner, has ruled out bringing on former chief executive Mike Ralston in a consulting capacity and says his unvested performance shares and share options have all lapsed since he stepped down as CEO earlier this month.

Ralston stepped down as CEO with immediate effect on September 14. The CEO position he held did not carry a seat on the board. When Ralston's exit was first announced, Blencowe said he would stay on in an advisory capacity for the rest of the year to help smooth the leadership transition. Executive chairperson Cameron Pearce said at the time: "Mike will continue to work with us on a full-time consultancy basis through to his planned retirement at the end of the year."

The company has since confirmed that the arrangement will not proceed, and that Ralston's performance shares and share options have lapsed as a result.

No successor to Ralston as CEO has yet been appointed. Chief operating officer Iain Wearing is leading day-to-day operations in the interim, and the board is continuing to search for a permanent replacement among multiple candidates.

Work on Blencowe's Orom-Cross graphite project in Uganda is continuing under Wearing, with the company pressing ahead with Phase 1 funding, engineering work, downstream development plans, and commercial activities.