Africa Energy Bank formally established in Abuja with $5bn of authorised capital
Afreximbank and the African Petroleum Producers’ Organisation formally established the Africa Energy Bank at its inaugural general meeting in Abuja on 31 October, appointing Helmy Ghazi as its first president and constituting a board for a lender that will finance the energy value chain from exploration to distribution.
The Africa Energy Bank was formally established in Abuja on 31 October at its inaugural general meeting, where Afreximbank and the African Petroleum Producers’ Organisation (APPO) appointed Helmy Ghazi as its first president and constituted its first board of directors, drawn from the public and private sectors and policy institutions across the continent.
With US$5bn of authorised capital, the bank will operate as an independent, supranational pan-African institution, seeking investment from governments, national oil companies, financial institutions and private investors, according to a joint statement from Afreximbank and APPO.
Its mandate covers exploration and production, transportation, processing, refining and distribution, with pipelines, storage, refineries and distribution networks among the assets it is expected to back, alongside intra-African trade in energy products and a lower reliance on imported petroleum products.
APPO’s 18 member countries are among the bank’s founders, and Nigeria’s Minister of State for Petroleum Resources (Oil), Heineken Lokpobiri, Afreximbank President George Elombi and Côte d’Ivoire’s Minister of Mines, Petroleum and Energy, Mamadou Sangafowa-Coulibaly, were among those at the meeting in Nigeria, which won the bid to host the bank.
Afreximbank and APPO put Africa’s energy investment needs at about US$200bn, and their statement says traditional financiers are withdrawing from fossil fuels while oil and gas remain central to the continent’s energy systems. “The creation of the Africa Energy Bank reaffirms African governments’ determination to secure their own energy future,” the statement said.
