Why credibility, not rhetoric, will determine whether Nigeria’s energy revolution succeeds or becomes another postponed ambition

BY OLU AROWOLO VERHEIJEN
Special Adviser to the President on Oil and Gas

For twenty-five years, NOG Energy Week has been one of the rooms where Nigeria tells the truth about energy: what we have promised, what we have postponed, what we have delivered, and what we must now become.

This year’s theme speaks of ambition, competitiveness and resilience. I want to add a fourth word: proof.

Because in this season — when records are being tested, reforms are being debated, and the future of our economy is being contested — Nigeria does not need louder promises. Nigeria needs proof that courage works. Proof that discipline works. Proof that when government does what it says, capital responds, production rises, and national confidence returns.

Let us begin with the world as it is, not as we wish it to be.

The global energy map has changed. Capital is no longer sentimental. It is not moved by speeches, slogans or sympathy. Capital has no passport. It is rational. It prices risk. It follows credibility. It asks one question: can this country turn resources into bankable projects, and bankable projects into reliable returns?

For Africa, that question is urgent. And for Nigeria, the scale of the task is equally clear: to sustain the current base and grow toward our 2030 production target, analysis shows a financing gap of about US$38.3 billion. That gap cannot be closed by rhetoric, and it cannot be closed by Nigeria alone. And that capital — from Lagos, Johannesburg, London, Houston, Abu Dhabi or Beijing — is asking for the same thing: credible rules, bankable projects, competitive costs, predictable regulation and disciplined execution. That is a warning — and an opportunity.

So the competition is no longer only geology against geology. It is government against government. It is rules against rules. It is delivery against delay.

And Nigeria has made a choice.

We have chosen not to be a warehouse of raw potential. We have chosen to become an engine of African industrialisation. We have chosen not merely to produce molecules, but to convert molecules into megawatts, fertiliser, petrochemicals, mobility, manufacturing, jobs and exports.

That is the real energy transition for Africa. Not transition as surrender. Transition as transformation.

Under the leadership of President Bola Ahmed Tinubu, this administration has done what many said was too difficult, too risky, too controversial, or too politically expensive. We began to remove the distortions that punished production and rewarded leakage. We took on reforms that had been discussed for years and delayed for decades.

We recalibrated fiscal terms, clarified regulation and streamlined oversight. We introduced targeted incentives and cut contracting timelines by more than half. And we made a clear statement to the world: Nigeria is no longer asking to be trusted; Nigeria is working to be bankable.

The results are not abstract.

We are targeting three million barrels per day and ten billion standard cubic feet of gas per day by the end of the decade. We now have more than 50 billion dollars of upstream projects in the visible pipeline. In the last three years, more than 10 billion dollars of long-awaited final investment decisions have come through.

Crude oil and condensate production has risen by about 400,000 barrels per day since 2023. Onshore production is at its strongest level in twenty years. Nigeria’s share of Africa’s upstream FIDs has risen dramatically — from the margins to leadership. External reserves have crossed 50 billion dollars. These are not talking points. They are signals. When the rules improve, capital moves.

And we are not only fixing oil and gas. We are resetting power.

For too long, the electricity market carried the weight of unpaid obligations, broken incentives and weak confidence. That is why the Presidential Power Sector Financial Reforms Programme is not merely a bond issue; it is a ₦4 trillion credibility programme. It is a negotiated reset of legacy obligations, payment discipline and market confidence across the generation, gas and financing chain.

It says to GenCos: produce with confidence. It says to gas suppliers: supply with confidence. It says to lenders and investors: Nigeria is rebuilding the bankability of the power value chain. And it says to Nigerians: the objective is not accounting elegance in Abuja; it is more reliable power for factories, SMEs, agro-processing, mining and homes.

And because power is only as viable as the fuel that feeds it, gas must move from aspiration to execution. Gas is not a slogan. Gas is Nigeria’s industrial backbone: the fuel for power, the feedstock for fertiliser and petrochemicals, the bridge to CNG mobility, LNG exports, regional integration and cleaner kitchens.

But we must be honest: reform has been hard on households, and the recent spike in cooking-gas prices was a warning that domestic supply, logistics, affordability and market discipline must move together. A gas-rich nation cannot be comfortable when families are priced back to firewood, charcoal or kerosene.

That is why we are acting on both supply and affordability. We are growing domestic LPG supply, rebuilding the import buffer where it is needed, strengthening market surveillance, and moving toward transparent pricing benchmarks so consumers, regulators and investors can see the market more clearly. The VAT Modification Order of 2024 zero-rates LPG and exempts the equipment and conversion chain — including cylinders, valves, regulators, conversion kits and installation services — from VAT.

Since January 2024, our office has supported Import Duty Exemption Certificates for LPG infrastructure worth about $92.6 million, including about $30.4 million this year alone. These incentives are not isolated measures; they align with the Decade of Gas, NNPC’s gas strategy and the Presidential CNG Initiative. Together, they point in one direction: a Nigeria where gas powers industry, electricity becomes more reliable, cooking becomes cleaner and more affordable, and reform finally shows up in the daily life of the Nigerian family.

And let us be very clear about Africa.

Africa does not need pity. Africa needs scale. The Dangote Refinery, at 650,000 barrels per day, is proof that African industrial scale is not aspirational; it is operational. Indigenous participation in gas has risen from 69 percent to 83 percent. Companies such as Seplat, Oando and Renaissance are not merely local players; they are continental energy actors. This is ownership. This is capability. This is the future taking institutional form.

But ownership must be matched with discipline. Local content must create value, not inflation. Regulation must accelerate, not obstruct. Policy must invite capital, not frighten it away. Every unnecessary delay is an export subsidy to another country. Every unclear approval is a tax on national ambition. Every project we fail to deliver becomes somebody else’s refinery, somebody else’s power plant, somebody else’s jobs.

That is why reform is never neutral.

Reform changes incentives. It changes habits. It changes the balance between those who benefited from complexity and those who deserve efficiency.

So, yes, reform will always meet resistance. Some of that resistance is sincere; change can be disruptive, and responsible leadership must listen. But some of it also comes from the comfort of old arrangements — from systems that worked well for a few, but not well enough for the country.

When we shorten approval timelines, we are not attacking anyone; we are defending national competitiveness. When we close revenue leakages, we are not settling scores; we are protecting the Nigerian people. When we insist on transparency, discipline and delivery, we are not being impatient; we are recognising that Nigeria has already waited too long.

And in moments of change, people will always find language to question the messenger. Too new. Too direct. Too ambitious. Too unconventional. But leadership is not validated by comfort. It is validated by results.

We welcome scrutiny. We welcome debate. We welcome honest criticism. But we will not apologise for reforming systems that must work better for Nigerians, for investors, and for the next generation.

And I say ‘we’ deliberately.

This record belongs to a team: the President who set the direction; state governments, the Ministers, regulators, our national oil company, government agencies, operators, investors, civil servants and workers across the value chain. It belongs also to Nigerians, who have carried the burden of reform and have every right to demand that reform now produces relief, jobs and dignity.

We have not finished the work. No serious reformer says the job is done. Inflation, affordability, security, metering, infrastructure and execution still demand urgency. But let no one confuse unfinished work with failed work. Nations move when people decide that temporary discomfort is better than permanent decline.

This is campaign season. So let the record be examined. Let the questions be asked. Let the debate be vigorous. But let it be honest.

Ask whether Nigeria is more credible today than yesterday. Ask whether investment is returning. Ask whether production is rising. Ask whether power-sector debt is finally being addressed. Ask whether gas is being treated as industrial infrastructure, not just export commodity. Ask whether the old excuses are still strong enough to defeat a new national ambition.

My answer is clear.

The age of Nigerian hesitation is ending. The age of Nigerian ambition has begun.

Our task now is to turn reform into relief, capital into projects, projects into jobs, and energy into national greatness.

History will not ask whether we inherited oil, gas, sun, rivers and talent. History will ask whether we converted them into prosperity. Whether we left behind pipelines instead of promises. Power plants instead of press releases. Institutions instead of personalities. Jobs instead of slogans. Confidence instead of cynicism.

The first twenty-five years of NOG helped build consensus. The next twenty-five must build delivery.

Let it be said that when the world changed, Nigeria did not shrink. Let it be said that when capital demanded credibility, Nigeria built it. Let it be said that when the establishment defended delay, a new generation chose execution. Let it be said that we stopped celebrating potential and started delivering performance.

That is the work. That is the record. That is the legacy.

Thank you.