The Chief Executive Officer of TotalEnergies, Patrick Pouyanne has expounded on why the company is investing $6 billion in energy projects in Angola instead of Nigeria.
Pouyanne, speaking to the African CEO panel in Kigali, Rwanda, said that the project had been diverted from Nigeria to Angola, a country with a more stable political framework, because of the inconsistency of policy decisions, according to Nairametrics.
The Total boss said that even though the Niger Delta is the most productive region in West Africa, the erratic policy environment has made investment impossible.
He emphasizes that for 12 years, TotalEnergies has not conducted any oil exploration in the region.
“Nigeria loves to open topics without closing them. You love to debate. There is always a new legislature in Nigeria about a new petroleum law. When you have such permanent debates, it’s difficult for investors looking for long-term structure to know what direction to go.
“In reality, the Niger Delta is the most prolific part of West Africa. But if you look at what happened, because of these debates, there has not been a single exploration in Nigeria for 12 years.
“It’s important to have a debate and then settle it and put a framework on the table that investors can trust.
“We have countries that have perfectly integrated policies like Angola. So, we went to Angola and announced a very large $6 billion project at the beginning of the week because there their framework is stable. So we know where we go,” Pouyanne said.
In addition, he said that two of the biggest challenges to investment in Nigeria are insecurity and a lack of human resources.
He underlined that investors need to be guaranteed that their investments are safe and that they are not exposed to violence and destruction.
He also added that the firm is training individuals to boost human capital and required talents needed in the oil and gas sector.
“What are the challenges? Security comes first. For a CEO like me, the security of my people is of utmost importance. Fortunately, we have customs in the Niger Delta to deal with it.
“We also have finding talent has a difficulty. In some countries like Nigeria and Rwanda, we find it difficult to find talent. Some of them have difficulty in education. And we can contribute to that. That’s some of the things we do, training people,” he said.
TotalEnergies announced in December 2023 that it would invest as much as $6 billion over the next few years into Africa’s largest oil producer.
At a time when international oil companies are shifting their attention away from onshore to offshore operations in Nigeria, the company said it would focus on deepwater projects and gas production.
Pouyanne, who was in Abuja at the meeting with President Bola Tinubu, said that France is supportive of the policies pursued by the present administration and seeks to solve security issues within the industry.
