Afreximbank Backs Nigerian-Owned Shoreline With $200 Million for Algeria Oil Project

African Export-Import Bank (Afreximbank) has approved a $200 million financing facility for Shoreline Power Company Limited and its partners to support the execution of a major oil and gas infrastructure project in Algeria.

The financing will enable Arkad SpA, an Italian engineering and construction company majority-owned by Nigeria’s Shoreline Group, to fulfil its portion of the $980 million Hassi Bir Rekaiz Field Development Phase 2a contract.

Arkad holds a 44 percent share of the engineering, procurement and construction contract awarded by Groupement Hassi Bir Rekaiz, a joint venture involving Algeria’s state-owned Sonatrach, Thailand’s PTTEP and Spain’s CEPSA.

The transaction represents an important expansion for the Nigerian-owned group and illustrates the growing participation of African businesses in large infrastructure projects outside their domestic markets.

Afreximbank structured the financing as a revolving facility comprising two components. The first is a $110 million contract-finance tranche that will support performance guarantees, advance-payment guarantees and working-capital requirements connected with Arkad’s portion of the Algerian contract.

The remaining $90 million is a revolving facility that Shoreline and its affiliates can use to pursue and execute pipeline and infrastructure projects in Nigeria and other approved markets.

The broader Hassi Bir Rekaiz development involves constructing a central processing facility designed to expand production from approximately 13,000 barrels per day to between 50,000 and 60,000 barrels per day.

Once completed, the expansion is expected to strengthen Algeria’s hydrocarbon production and increase foreign-exchange earnings for Sonatrach and the wider Algerian economy.

The project is also expected to generate approximately 6,000 jobs and stimulate demand across Algeria’s engineering, construction and energy supply chains.

Beyond its immediate financial value, the transaction provides Shoreline with an opportunity to establish a record of delivering complex energy projects at a sovereign scale.

Successful execution could improve the group’s ability to secure additional engineering and infrastructure contracts across Africa.

Arkad will participate in the development alongside Petrojet, an Egyptian state-owned engineering company. The partnership brings together Nigerian ownership, Italian technical capacity and Egyptian engineering experience.

Afreximbank said the transaction supports its objective of helping African-owned contractors compete with larger international construction companies that have traditionally dominated the continent’s major infrastructure contracts.

The bank arranged and funded the entire $200 million facility under its Engineering, Procurement and Construction Initiative.

The programme provides financing and other institutional support to African contractors bidding for capital-intensive projects.

The transaction emerged from commercial engagements at the 2025 Intra-African Trade Fair in Algiers, where Afreximbank supported the partnership between Arkad and Petrojet. The fair generated approximately $50 billion in trade and investment agreements.

Kanayo Awani, Afreximbank’s Executive Vice President for Intra-African Trade and Export Development, said the financing demonstrated the capacity of African-owned engineering groups to participate in major global projects.

She noted that the facility would support Algeria’s energy infrastructure while expanding high-value trade in engineering and construction services involving Nigeria, Egypt and Italy.

The deal is Afreximbank’s first financing intervention supporting a Sub-Saharan African contractor undertaking a major infrastructure project in North Africa.

For Shoreline, the facility offers both immediate contract funding and longer-term financial capacity to pursue other opportunities.

For African investors, it represents a shift from conventional commodity trade towards the cross-border export of engineering expertise, project management and infrastructure services.