Nigeria must urgently strengthen domestic financing and indigenous technical capacity to sustain investment in its oil and gas industry as international lenders become increasingly reluctant to fund African energy projects, Oando Plc has warned.
Alero Balogun, General Manager, Corporate Communications at Oando, said Nigeria needed to develop a robust domestic financial ecosystem capable of supporting long-term, capital-intensive energy projects that foreign financiers were increasingly unwilling to back.
She made the call during a high-level strategic panel session at the 2026 Energy Conference of the Association of Energy Correspondents of Nigeria (NAEC) in Lagos.
The conference, themed “Access to Assets: Empowering Players and Driving Growth,” brought together industry executives, regulators and energy professionals to examine the financial, regulatory and operational barriers limiting investment and growth across Nigeria’s energy sector.
Balogun said the funding requirements of Nigeria’s oil and gas industry were increasingly out of step with the priorities of international lending institutions, creating a significant financing gap for indigenous operators seeking to develop and acquire energy assets.
“There is a mismatch between the kind of capital that Nigeria or Africa’s energy sector requires and what the international lending system is currently prepared to provide,” she said.
According to her, the growing reluctance of international financiers to support African oil and gas projects makes it imperative for Nigeria to mobilise domestic savings, deepen local financial markets and develop alternative funding structures for strategic energy investments.
“Nigerians have to start to build our own financial ecosystem so that we are doing the financing ourselves,” she stressed.
Nigeria’s energy investment gap demands local solutions
Balogun noted that oil and gas investments typically require patient capital because projects often involve lengthy development periods, substantial upfront expenditure and significant operational risks before generating returns.
She warned that the reluctance of foreign lenders to finance such projects could constrain indigenous participation in exploration, production and other segments of the energy value chain unless Nigeria developed stronger domestic financing capacity.
She attributed the financing challenges to a combination of operational risks, inconsistent policies and regulatory uncertainty across African markets.
According to her, improving the investment climate and mobilising local capital would be essential to expanding indigenous companies’ access to oil and gas assets and enabling them to compete more effectively.
For Nigeria, the challenge extends beyond securing loans. Indigenous operators need access to affordable, long-tenor financing that reflects the economics of energy development, rather than funding arrangements designed primarily for shorter-term commercial transactions.
Developing that capacity would require deeper domestic capital markets, stronger participation by Nigerian financial institutions and institutional investors, and a more predictable regulatory environment capable of attracting long-term investment.
Balogun’s intervention underscores a central issue confronting Nigeria’s energy industry: the need to bridge the gap between the capital required to develop domestic resources and the financing available to indigenous companies.
Industry leaders seek greater access to energy assets
The NAEC conference focused on improving access to assets, finance and other resources needed to expand indigenous participation and stimulate sustainable growth across Nigeria’s energy industry.
Other panellists included Austin Avuru, Executive Chairman and Founder of AA Holdings Ltd; Cecilia Olajumoke Ajayi, President of the Nigerian Association of Petroleum Explorationists (NAPE); and Wole Ogunsanya, Chairman of the Petroleum Technology Association of Nigeria (PETAN).
Chike Nwosu, Group Chief Executive Officer of HSI Energies Ltd, moderated the session.
The discussions highlighted the importance of aligning access to assets with financing, technical expertise and a stable investment environment if Nigerian-owned energy companies are to expand their operations and strengthen their competitiveness.
As Nigeria seeks to attract investment, increase production and develop its indigenous energy industry, the ability to mobilise domestic capital could become an increasingly important determinant of how quickly local companies can acquire assets, execute projects and capture more value across the oil and gas value chain.