African Petroleum Producers’ Organisation (APPO), has affirmed that the African Energy Bank has raised 50 per cent of the total investment to kick off its operations.
Executive Secretary of the African Petroleum Producers’ Organisation (APPO), promoter of the bank, Dr. Omar Farouk Ibrahim, who declared this in a remark at the Practical Nigerian Content (PNC) forum in Yenagoa, Bayelsa State on Tuesday, expressed optimism that the bank would begin operations before the end of the first quarter in 2025.
Speaking on the challenges that led to the establishment of the bank, Farouk maintained that the financial institution is to give filip to investment independence drive by Africa.
“For 70 years that Africans have been producing oil and gas, we have been looking outside for everything until 2015 when the world gathered in Paris to have a global paradigm shift on fossil fuel and this has a direct effect on us in Africa because all African leaders present at the meeting appended their signatures to the document on the decision.
“Part of the major hurdle we faced was how to fill the gap to be created by the hitherto financier of fossil fuel value chain. We began to look for $5 billion.
“We have over 125 billion barrels of oil reserves and over 600bn scuf of gas in Africa, and we have been heavily depending on outside for exploration and exploitation of these resources.
“We said no, we need to use our oil and gas to develop our continent the way those who came up with the policy have been able to use oil and gas to develop their continent. For 150 years, these people have emitted 2,500 Giga tonnes of gas from fossil fuel into the atmosphere.
“Between 2020 and today, we have gone very far on this energy bank. The African Energy Bank will be the first development bank to have been started and completed in record time.
“Part of our achievements is that Ghana and Nigeria signed in hat order to ratify a treaty that led to the establishment of the bank. As of today, we have been able to raise 50 per cent of the total investment portfolio to start the bank, and before the end of the first quarter of 2025, the bank will start.”
