South African independent Labat Africa, backed by US private equity funds, is farming into a handful of deepwater blocks offshore southern Africa’s Namibia.

The Johannesburg Stock Exchange-listed company has executed a letter of intent with Amicitia Holdings Limited to buy all of the issued shares in Palatina Petroleum Limited‚ which would give it a majority participating interest in five Namibian exploration blocks.

“This is an opportunity that was introduced to us by GEM [Global Engineering Markets], one of our shareholders. GEM will be the main funder for the development of the leases acquired by Labat,” Labat Africa CEO Brian van Rooyen said in a stock exchange announcement.