…says new terminal will evacuate Ogoni oil
President Bola Tinubu has inaugurated the first indigenous oil terminal, $400 million Otakikpo project, which is located in the Oceanic area of Ikuru town in the easternmost part of Rivers State.
This is as the president announced that the era of anxieties over offshore financing are almost over because of the $5 billion African Energy Bank (AEB) fund, which, he said, is set to begin operations.
Excitement is already in the air as the terminal is expected to create a new route to export. The company behind the deal, Lekoil, said the Otakikpo terminal would make them one of the leading indigenous oil companies in Nigeria.
Lekoil said the inauguration of the strategic export channel, through which Lekoil evacuates crude oil from the Otakikpo field, is in line with ongoing reforms to expand Nigeria’s production capacity towards Nigeria’s economic development.
Read also: Nigeria exports first oil shipment from Otakikpo onshore terminal
President Tinubu, who was represented at the inauguration by Heineken Lokpobiri, Minister of State for Petroleum (Oil), said the era of battling with a lack of finance is over.
According to him, the worst challenge in the upstream operation is access to finance, and the promoters of AEB have met all its obligations for the operations.
He thus assured Green Energy International Limited (GEIL) and all others that the era of perhaps looking elsewhere for finance will soon be over.
“We have discovered that the biggest challenge we have in Africa is access to, you know, finance. And that was why we’ve come up with the African Energy Bank, which is ready to go. Nigeria, as the host country, has met its obligations.
“We have met all our obligations, legal, financial. We have met all our obligations. We are waiting, you know, for the bank to take off, which I think will take off, you know, any moment from now.”
President Tinubu commended the management of GEIL, recalling that the indigenous firm started from a marginal field the same time as other awardees who spent their finances on private jets, while GEIL decided to build an export terminal to create value in the industry.
He assured the company and other operators that are keeping to the terms of their licences of total support and collaboration.
Read also: Rising costs, output slump squeeze onshore oil producers
Tinubu gave update on the resumption of oil operations in Ogoni. “I need to state that in the commitment of the government that is already talking with the Ogoni people to resolve the Ogoni problem.
“And once the Ogoni problem is resolved, this will be the best terminal that will evacuate the crude oil we produce from Ogoni.”
He appealed to the Ogoni leaders to consider that for as long as the oil asset remains in the ground, neither the Ogoni nor the FG would extract any benefit from it.
Speaking, Gbenga Komolafe, the CEO of the Nigerian Upstream Petroleum Regulatory Commission (NUPRC), said the terminal is historic on two levels.
According to him, it expands Nigeria’s crude export infrastructure at a critical time and demonstrates the capacity of Nigerian operators to deliver world-class projects once thought possible only for international major players.
He further noted that the Otakiko terminal is significant to the present national crude oil production, that is, about 1.8million barrels, because the efficiency of evacuation and export is critical.
Komolafe also said that by creating an alternative export hub in Rivers State, the Otakikpo terminal reduces over-reliance on existing terminals, many of which are operating at near capacity and are exposed to security and pipeline challenges.
Read also: Nigeria’s first gas-to-power project unveiled in Andoni, Rivers State
He said the industry’s indigenous operators had evolved to the stage of accounting for 30% of the national production.
In a statement, Lekan Akinyanmi, CEO of Lekoil, one of partners in GEIL, said the Otakikpo Onshore Crude Oil Export Terminal is not just infrastructure; “It is a symbol of progress, credibility, and the determination of indigenous producers to deliver value on a global stage.”
Meanwhile, Anthony Adegbulugbe, the CEO of GEIL, said the storage capacity of the terminal is 750,000 barrels, which is expandable to three million barrels.
He also said it has a pumping capacity of 360,000bpd. The CEO added that since June 2025, the company has already completed four export operations, totaling one million barrels of crude oil.
