By Onu Okorie
Group Chief Executive Officer of NNPC Limited, Engr. Bashir Bayo Ojulari, has called for stronger collaboration across Nigeria’s energy industry stakeholders.
Ojulari made the call on Tuesday while delivering the keynote address at the opening ceremony of the 25th NOG Energy Week at the Bola Ahmed Tinubu International Conference Centre in Abuja.
He said that strategic partnerships are essential to unlocking Africa’s vast energy potential, attracting investment and driving industrial growth.
Calling for greater cooperation among stakeholders, he urged governments, national oil companies, investors, regulators, financiers, academia and service providers to move beyond transactional engagements to strategic partnerships capable of creating integrated energy value chains across the continent.
Highlighting the company’s performance over the past year, the NNPC chief said Nigeria’s crude oil production has risen to 1.71 million barrels per day, the highest level recorded in five years.
Also the NNPC Exploration and Production Limited NEPL has achieved a record output of 365,000 barrels per day.
He also disclosed that gas production climbed to 7.5 billion standard cubic feet per day, following the successful completion of the River Niger crossing on the Ajaokuta-Kaduna-Kano (AKK) Gas Pipeline and the commissioning of the ANOH Gas Processing Plant.
According to him, “NNPC recorded an average 98 per cent recovery across its five crude oil export terminals between April 2025 and May 2026, a significant improvement from operational lows of about one per cent recorded at the Bonny Oil and Gas Terminal in June 2022.”
Ojulari said the company maintained 100 per cent compliance with all Joint Venture cash call obligations throughout 2025 and up to June 2026, while sustaining efforts to increase Nigeria’s crude oil production to two million barrels per day.
The NNPC boss further revealed that the company signed landmark Gas Sale and Purchase Agreements covering 1.29 billion standard cubic feet per day for long-term LNG feed gas and 750 million standard cubic feet per day for domestic industrial gas supply to DFL FZE and Dangote Refinery.
He said the agreements represent more than $20 billion in associated investments, with seven additional commercial transactions currently in the pipeline.
Ojulari also noted that NNPC resumed full monthly remittances to the Federation Account in July 2025, reinstated monthly business performance reporting and hosted its first-ever earnings call in November 2025 as part of efforts to strengthen transparency, accountability and investor confidence.
”At NNPC Limited, we see ourselves not just as an energy producer but as an ecosystem builder—connecting capital, technology, policy, talent and markets to create lasting value for Nigeria and Africa,” he said.
Ojulari identified fragmented collaboration as one of the major obstacles to Africa’s energy transformation, citing weak linkages between resource owners and operators, investors and projects, innovation and execution, and policy and capital.
Despite Africa holding about 17 per cent of global natural gas reserves alongside abundant oil and renewable energy resources, he lamented that the continent still attracts only a small share of global energy investment.
”The future of African energy will not be determined solely by the resources beneath our soil, but by the quality of the partnerships we forge above it. The opportunity before us is extraordinary. The responsibility is ours. And the time to act is now,” he said.
The 25th edition of NOG Energy Week, regarded as Africa’s premier oil, gas and energy conference and exhibition, brings together global energy leaders, policymakers, investors and innovators to discuss the future of energy, sustainability and industrial development across Nigeria and the continent.
