The federal government has secured commitments from foreign investor groups to mobilise $21 billion in fresh capital for Nigeria’s oil and gas sector, the Minister of State for Petroleum Resources (Oil), Heineken Lokpobiri, has disclosed.
The Minister said the commitments followed his recent engagements in Abu Dhabi, at the just-concluded ADIPEC conference, where global investors showed renewed interest in Nigeria as a diversification destination amid geopolitical risks in the Gulf region.
Lokpobiri stated this on Monday in Lagos, at the opening of the 44th annual international conference of the Nigerian Association of Petroleum Explorationists (NAPE), with the theme, “Unlocking More Barrels, Driving Reserve Growth through Exploration, Local Capabilities and Adaptive Technologies.”
Lokpobiri said the government was linking the foreign groups to Nigerian companies to discuss commercial details, as part of efforts to mobilise capital for development at a time Western lenders are restricting funding to Africa.
He said: “I can assure you that we had one or two non-binding MOUs with groups. One group is willing to mobilise $15 billion to invest in Nigeria. And their argument is that we know that in terms of spare capacity, it is more in the Gulf region. But with what has happened in the Strait of Hormuz, it is important for companies that have money to diversify their investments in terms of locations.
“Some of them are willing to come to Nigeria and invest. So, if there is any disruption in one location, the investment in Nigeria will continue to sustain your cash flow. There’s another group that is committing $6 billion. And so, what I’m doing is linking those companies, those groups to companies in Nigeria.”
The Minister said he was deepening collaboration between the foreign groups and local operators, noting that some chief executives at the conference were already in discussion with him.
He said he was not interested in the commercials, but in bringing the parties together to negotiate details.
Lokpobiri said the push for new capital was necessary because the West has weaponised access to capital against the Global South, particularly Africa.
That, he said, led to the creation of the African Energy Bank.
He recalled that on October 31, 2026, the President of Afreximbank and the President of the African Petroleum Producers’ Organisation (APPO) came to Nigeria for the formal launch of the bank.
According to him, the bank’s annual general meeting had been held, conditions precedent met, and a president and board appointed, adding that it set to formally take off on January 4, 2027 in Abuja.
The Minister said discussions with the incoming investor groups also include how to position the African Energy Bank to raise funding for the industry.
Lokpobiri reviewed the progress made since his appointment in August 2023, when he said the industry was in coma state and oil production was about one million barrels per day, inclusive of condensates.
“When I was appointed minister in August 2023, the industry was in comatose. Our production was about a million barrels, inclusive of condensates. And now NUPRC is here, I think the records as of today show that we are doing over 1.8 million barrels per day,” he said.
He said the mandate given by President Bola Tinubu was to build a bigger pie that the federation can benefit from.
He said oil production has grown by over 80 percent since the government came in, though Nigeria is not yet where it wants to be.
Active rigs, he said, have risen from about 10 to over 60, with continuous drilling campaigns by different operators.
The Minister dismissed the value of reserves on paper, citing Venezuela which has over 300 billion barrels of reserves but remains one of the poorest countries in the world.
He described Nigeria’s 37 billion barrels oil reserves and 215 trillion cubic feet of gas deposit as academic unless they were unlocked and taken to market.
He said the modest efforts of the government have strengthened the economy, citing the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) records showing foreign reserves of about $56 billion, 85 percent of which came from oil and gas.
Lokpobiri warned that Nigeria faces a potential manpower crisis if it fails to rebuild training pipelines for geoscientists and petroleum engineers.
He recalled an incubation centre in Warri, Delta State, where young graduates gained real industry skills, which has since been shut down.
He backed NAPE’s plan to establish an academy, urging the industry to support it and to extend support to universities, where many lecturers lack practical experience.
“So, NAPE came to my office a few weeks ago and said they are nursing an idea of a NAPE academy. The details could be worked out. My own is that the industry needs to support NAPE. That idea needs to be supported,” Lokpobiri said.
He called for more frontier exploration in the Anambra Basin, Benue Trough, Dahomey Basin and other basins beyond the Niger Delta, noting that the Petroleum Industry Act (PIA) provides a fund for frontier exploration.
He said if Nigeria explores aggressively, reserves could more than double, with an additional 18 billion barrels potentially in deepwater yet to be certified.
The Minister said the global energy landscape was being redesigned and Nigeria had been strategically positioned in the new map, adding that the government awaits recommendations from experts at the conference.
Peter Uzoho
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