Abuja. April 24, 2025 -The Federal Government has expressed optimism that the acquisition of assets of divesting International Oil Companies by Nigerian firms would lead to increased oil production.
Sen. Heineken Lokpobiri, the Minister of State Petroleum Resources (Oil), expressed on the optimism on Wednesday during a meeting with the management of Renaissance Africa Energy.
He urged oil companies to boost their production to meet both domestic and export demands and boost revenue remittance to government coffers.
He expressed regret that Nigeria’s oil production has stagnated at 1.5 million barrels per day in spite despite of the 2.1 million barrels per day benchmark envisaged in 2025 budget.
The minister said Nigeria had the most skilled labour force in the oil and gas industry in Africa and expressed confidence that the takeover of divested assets by Nigerian firms would lead to an increase in oil production.
He said the acquisition the assets by Nigerians meant that critical decisions by the companies would now be taken in Nigeria rather than in faraway headquarters.
“Divestment is a global practice. If you want to attract investments, you must also allow people to divest when they want to.
“I’m proud to say that under the leadership of President Bola Tinubu, these divestments were basically one of the obstacles to the flow of investments.
“If you unveil Shell, if you unveil ExxonMobil, if you unveil Chevron, if you unveil all the IOCs, beyond the name and maybe a few of their top management, all those you see who had created these companies are Nigerians,”. The minister said.
He urged Renaissance management to prove its mettle by increasing the company’s oil production
Renaissance recently acquired assets of Shell Petroleum Development Company of Nigeria.
Dr Tony Attah, the Chief Executive of Renaissance, promised that his company would do better than Shell in managing the divested assets.
“Shell did its exploration, exploitation, and production to develop its own countries. But we, as Renaissance, are here to do exactly the same business, perhaps do it better to develop our own country, Nigeria.
“I think, for me personally, that is where the delineation and difference come in.
“It is about time that Nigeria takes that centre stage where we are called the giants of Africa.
“I know there are still one or two areas where we can still step forward if you go to the entertainment industry, the telcos, perhaps the banking, but I think energy is one area where, if you look at all the indices, we are leading, but we are leading based on data. But we want to lead and lead practically and be the energy leader in Africa,” he said.
