Africa’s Energy Lobby Condemns Funding Discrimination

The African Energy Chamber (AEC) is protesting what it sees as discrimination by Western lenders in supporting the continent’s oil and gas projects, with owners and investors forced to suspend development plans, or into alternative local sourcing.

Nj Ayuk, the chamber’s executive chairman, told Tradeque that by refusing to bankroll Africa’s oil and gas projects, with a direct bearing on the continent’s transitioning from energy poverty, lenders from the global north are engaging in financial apartheid that has nearly crippled the industry.

Mr Ayuk did not discuss their legal strategy, but suggested the lobby was mooting a legal challenge. He said African energy lobbies, governments and project sponsors are working together on a joint lawsuit, whose details “we will update soon.”

A spokesperson for the Total Energies-led East African Crude Oil Pipeline (Eacop) – which several lenders have declined to support – said the AEC had not yet approached the developers to discuss a potential joint lawsuit.

Citing environmental risk and oil-related climate backlash, European and American banks have heeded activist campaigns and declined to finance fossil fuel projects in Africa, the top of which is the Eacop, whose total cost is $5 billion.