A disgruntled Viking Mines shareholder has won a battle to oust one of the West Africa-focused gold explorer’s directors — and the chairman has followed him out the door.

Viking (ASX:VKA) executive director Peter McMickan was voted out at yesterday’s annual general meeting and replaced by Charles Thomas, a nominee of shareholder GTT Global Opportunities.

In August, GTT called for the company to hold a meeting to consider the appointment of Mr Thomas and George Henderson as directors and removal of executive chairman John Gardener and Mr McMickan.

Mr Gardner stood down following the ousting of Mr McMickan. Non-executive director and deputy chairman Ray Whitten was named acting chairman. Michael Cox was also given a seat on the board.

GTT holds a 16.8 per cent stake with 52.6 million shares in Viking and has been steadily increasing its stake after joining the share register with the purchase of 15.8 million shares in June.

Viking's share price over the past year. Source: Investing.com
Viking’s share price over the past year. Source: Investing.com

The shareholder is linked with Rocco Tassone, a director of GTT. Mr Tassone is also a former non-executive director of Lepidico (formerly Platypus Minerals).

Following Mr Thomas’ election to the board, GTT withdrew its nominations for Patrick Glovac and Mr Tassone to be appointed to the board.

Viking has been delayed in receiving $US8 million cash of the $US10 million sale of its Akoase gold project after ownership of the purchasing company was transferred to a substantial Ghanaian trading company, BXC Ghana.

In the September quarter, Viking received another $2 million from the sale, bringing its sales proceeds up to $US5 million.

Stockhead is seeking comment from Viking.

Shares in Viking were down 3.1 per cent to 3.1c in Thursday morning trade.