Chad says it has nationalised all assets owned by Exxon Mobil

Chad has nationalised all the assets and rights, including hydrocarbon permits and exploration and production authorisations, that belonged to a subsidiary of Exxon Mobil, the West African nation’s energy and hydrocarbons ministry said in a statement on Thursday.

Exxon Mobil said in December 2022 that it had closed the sale of its operations in Chad and Cameroon to London-listed Savannah Energy in a $407m deal, but the Chadian government contested the agreement, saying the final terms were different from what had been presented to it.

The government warned then that it may ask courts to block Savannah’s purchase of Exxon’s assets in the country and take further steps to protect its interests.

Exxon’s assets included a 40 percent stake in Chad’s Doba oil project, which comprises seven producing oilfields with a combined output of 28,000 barrels per day (bpd).

It also included Exxon’s interest in the more than 1,000km (621-mile) Chad-Cameroon pipeline from the landlocked nation to the Atlantic Gulf of Guinea coast through which its crude is exported.

Exxon Mobil was not immediately available for comment.

But on Friday, Savannah said it plans to pursue all its legal rights to contest Chad’s move a day earlier to nationalise its upstream assets in the African country.

“The actions of the Republic of Chad are in direct breach of the Conventions to which SCI and the Republic of Chad are, amongst others, party,” its statement read.

“The Conventions are subject to the jurisdiction of an ICC tribunal, seated in Paris and the Company intends to pursue all of its legal rights.”

Chad, which has the 10th largest reserves in Africa, exports 90 percent of its oil.