Big oil lends to Nigeria
Published: May 28 2008 03:00 | Last updated: May 28 2008 03:00
Talk about trying to make full use of a big balance sheet. Royal Dutch Shell is one of a number of oil majors talking to the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation, the state-run oil company, about terms for huge loans to kickstart exploration and production in the country. Between them, Shell, ExxonMobil and Total are contributing about $6bn.
Picking up the tab like this is not entirely new. After all, any production-sharing arrangement with a partner nation is a de facto loan. The major builds the infrastructure and the host repays it in oil, with a profit added on. Majors have made actual loans in the past, too. In 2001, for example, Shell set up a revolving credit facility to support Niger Delta contractors. But that was tiny – $30m – and split three ways with the World Bank and a local bank.
A plan for direct loans totalling $6bn marks a significant escalation. Why now? Nigeria is a relatively mature producer and its inability to honour its share of joint venture cash calls is not a new phenomenon.
The answer may lie in the majors’ sluggish global production growth and their increasing intolerance for avoidable delays. The oil companies may hope that a schedule of interest payments, however lenient, will at least focus minds at the oil ministry; since the elections last April, the new government has dragged its heels in awarding important services contracts. An outstanding loan could also give officials a stronger incentive to get tough on militant attacks and industrial disputes, which continue to cause shutdowns. An ongoing tax dispute – Shell and Exxon are accused of owing $2bn – may also be related. Investors might query the returns on this use of their capital and whether the NNPC had exhausted other sources of financing. It is up to the majors to convince them there was no alternative to get the taps flowing.
Copyright The Financial Times Limited 2008
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Royal Dutch Shell conspired directly with Hitler, financed the Nazi Party, was anti-Semitic and sold out its own Dutch Jewish employees to the Nazis. Shell had a close relationship with the Nazis during and after the reign of Sir Henri Deterding, an ardent Nazi, and the founder and decades long leader of the Royal Dutch Shell Group. His burial ceremony, which had all the trappings of a state funeral, was held at his private estate in Mecklenburg, Germany. The spectacle (photographs below) included a funeral procession led by a horse drawn funeral hearse with senior Nazis officials and senior Royal Dutch Shell directors in attendance, Nazi salutes at the graveside, swastika banners on display and wreaths and personal tributes from Adolf Hitler and Reichsmarschall, Hermann Goring. Deterding was an honored associate and supporter of Hitler and a personal friend of Goring.
Deterding was the guest of Hitler during a four day summit meeting at Berchtesgaden. Sir Henri and Hitler both had ambitions on Russian oil fields. Only an honored personal guest would be rewarded with a private four day meeting at Hitler’s mountain top retreat.
IN JULY 2007, MR BILL CAMPBELL (ABOVE, A RETIRED GROUP AUDITOR OF SHELL INTERNATIONAL SENT AN EMAIL TO EVERY UK MP AND MEMBER OF THE HOUSE OF LORDS: 
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A head-cut image of Alfred Donovan (now deceased) appears courtesy of The Wall Street Journal.
