Fresh facts emerged Wednesday evening after the news broke that Nigerian billionaire and Chairman of Forte Oil Plc, Mr Femi Otedola, has exited his interests in Forte Oil.
This move comes three years after the firm sold 17 per cent of its equity to a Swiss oil trading firm.
The company had on Monday, hinted that the divestment by its majority shareholder in a notice signed by its General Counsel, Mr Akinleye Olagbende, saying “Forte Oil Plc hereby notifies the Nigerian Stock Exchange, Securities and Exchange Commission, shareholders and the investing community that its majority shareholder, Mr Femi Otedola, has reached an agreement with the Prudent Energy team, investing through Ignite Investments and Commodities Limited, to divest of his full 75 per cent direct and indirect shareholding in the company’s downstream business.
“Mr Otedola’s divestment from the downstream business is pursuant to his decision to explore and maximise business opportunities in refining and petrochemicals. The transaction is expected to close in the first quarter of 2019 subject to the satisfaction of various conditions and receipt of applicable regulatory approvals.”
Details extracted from his verified Instagram handle showed that he exited the Nigerian petroleum sector so as to concentrate on his power generation business.
Otedola averred that “A few years ago, my team and I embarked on an arduous task of transforming a moribund petroleum marketing business, African Petroleum Plc (formerly British Petroleum) into Forte Oil Plc; a leading integrated solutions provider with solid footprints in downstream petroleum marketing, Upstream Services and Power Generation and one in which we built intrinsic value to the benefits of our shareholders.
Continuing, he added that “In line with my principle of business focus, we have divested from our marketing and upstream businesses and shall from now on focus and consolidate on the gains of our power generation business, Geregu Power Plc.
“We wish our successors the very best and urge them to build on our legacies which have been established since 1964.”
Industry analysts who barred their mind on the shocking development said there may be more to the development which may be made public in days ahead.
