Kunle Kalejaye 20 June 2016, Sweetcrude, Lagos – Managing Director, Shell Petroleum Development Company of Nigeria, SPDC, and Country Chair, Shell Companies in Nigeria, Mr. Osagie Okunbor, has hinted that the company won’t exit Nigeria as widely speculated.
Okunbor stated this in Lagos, saying the company was committed to Nigeria because of its huge deepwater and shallow water assets in the country.
Royal Dutch Shell had recently said it could exit up to 10 countries under a previously announced plan to sell oil and gas assets over two years.
Recently, the Royal Dutch Shell, the parent company of the Nigerian subsidiary, announced it would be exiting up to 10 countries as it also said it would be cutting at least 12,500 jobs over two years to the end of 2016 due to low oil prices.
The Anglo-Dutch group announced an 89 percent drop in net profit for the first quarter of 2016, blaming the slump on the price of crude.
Shell’s Country Chair in Nigeria revealed that the company is currently not considering downstream business in Nigeria, but plans to focus more on deep water projects.
“Shell is not currently considering downstream business in Nigeria… but we want to increase our position in deep water having been on onshore for close to 50 years.
“Deep water is an area where we have comparative technology advantage over indigenous players. They (indigenous players) cannot come to deep water because the technology is complex. It is an area we have superior technology advantage.
“We also want to focus on increased domestic supply of gas,” Okunbor said.