Oil & Gas

Nigeria’s oil and gas industry has witnessed significant changes over the last decade. The passage of the Nigerian Oil and Gas Industry Development Content Act (“Local Content Act”) as well as the government’s overt indigenous policy and onshore divestments by oil and gas majors has led to the emergence of significant local players in the upstream oil and gas industry. The Local Content Act has also fostered the growth of a budding indigenous service industry for the upstream sector. These advances have led to the formation of new partnerships between (mostly new) international players and the indigenous companies.

Our Energy Practice Team has been at the centre of these developments. We are assisting international players in their partnerships with local companies; facilitating major oil and gas acquisitions; and helping existing and new players understand their responsibilities in the emerging regulatory framework.

With the more recent passage of the Petroleum Industry Act (“PIA”), our lawyers led the debate around the development of the legislation, having advised various key industry stakeholders, including members of the national assembly and private sector operators on significant aspects of the law. Since its passage, we have been supporting both public and private entities in the interpretation and implementation of the provisions of the PIA poised to promote petroleum products price deregulation, downstream gas utilisation and the establishment of private refineries which are expected to drive the growth of the downstream petroleum sector in the immediate future.

The Energy Practice Team still runs the only website (petroleumindustrybill.com) which was dedicated to providing up-to-date news, information and analysis of the Bill and now providing updates around the implementation of the PIA.