OZ Minerals shareholders have voted to accept BHP’s $9.6 billion takeover offer, as senior members of the native title group that hosts the copper mines of the two companies vowed to soothe a bitter factional split.

BHP will likely complete the acquisition of OZ on May 2, after 98.33 per cent of OZ shareholders voted on Thursday to sell their shares to BHP for $28.25 a share. The first $1.75 of that $28.25 will come in the form of the dividend that was announced by the OZ board on Thursday as one of its final acts.