Nigerian billionaire Folorunso Alakija hosts top UAE diplomats as crude prices surge

Folorunso Alakija, Nigerian billionaire and vice chair of Famfa Oil, hosted senior United Arab Emirates diplomats in Lagos this week, bringing renewed attention to one of West Africa’s most lucrative offshore energy partnerships as crude prices hold near multi-month highs.

Alakija received UAE Ambassador to Nigeria Salem Saeed AlShamsi and Consul General Salem Aljaberi at Famfa Oil’s headquarters, alongside the company’s executive director, Folarin Alakija. The discussions focused on trade ties and energy cooperation, coming at a time when Gulf investors and African producers are reassessing capital flows ahead of the fourth quarter.

“Our time together was warm and engaging,” Alakija said in a statement. “We exchanged thoughts on matters of mutual interest and the importance of building relationships founded on respect, understanding and shared purpose.”

Global crude supplies tighten above $90

The diplomatic outreach arrives during a volatile stretch for global crude desks, which have dismantled early-year forecasts of an oversupplied market. Supply outages and shipping bottlenecks at key maritime passages have kept physical supplies tight and added a stubborn risk premium to crude benchmarks.

Brent crude, the international marker, traded near $95.67 a barrel on Friday, while U.S. benchmark West Texas Intermediate held closely behind at $91.56. Oil has traced a sharp recovery this year. Prices bottomed out at $55.76 a barrel in late January as traders fretted over sluggish global factory activity. A wave of conflict across the Middle East quickly reversed that decline, driving Brent to a high of $119.48 in May.

While rising electric vehicle adoption in China has placed a ceiling on how high prices can climb, physical barrels remain difficult to source. Global commercial stockpiles shrank by roughly 69 million barrels over the past three months, prompting trading desks across Wall Street to raise their year-end price targets and pencil in an $80 floor through the winter months.

Folorunsho Alakija billion-dollar Famfa Oil legacy

For Alakija, the current price environment strengthens the economic standing of Famfa Oil, the company that anchors her fortune of more than $1 billion. Her entry into the oil business dates back to September 1991, when Famfa Oil was incorporated. In August 1993, the company secured an oil prospecting license, OPL 216, covering a 617,000-acre offshore tract in the deep waters of the central Niger Delta.

To finance deepwater exploration, Famfa brought in partners. In September 1996, the company signed a deed of assignment transferring a 40 percent operating stake in OPL 216 to Star Deep Water Petroleum. Two years later, Brazilian state-controlled producer Petrobras acquired an 8 percent interest. That trimmed Star Deep’s holding to 32 percent while Famfa retained a controlling 60 percent stake. Corporate restructuring soon followed offshore discoveries.

When Chevron acquired Texaco in October 2000, it absorbed Star Deep Water Petroleum and assumed operatorship of the asset. Nigerian authorities converted the prospecting lease into a commercial oil mining lease, OML 127, in December 2004. To eliminate duplicate costs and maximize recovery from the straddled reservoir, partners signed a unitization agreement in February 2005 with neighboring block OPL 217, operated at the time by Statoil alongside the state-owned Nigerian National Petroleum Corp.

Today, the shared Agbami reservoir lies 70 miles offshore in nearly 4,800 feet of water, spanning 45,000 acres across blocks OML 127 and OML 128. Chevron affiliate Star Deep Water Petroleum still operates the field alongside Famfa Oil, NNPC, Texaco Nigeria Outer Shelf, Equinor (formerly Statoil), and Petrobras — remaining one of the primary revenue drivers for Nigeria’s deepwater output.