Nigeria's nationalization of British Petroleum

bibliographic database
Line

Periodical article

Title:	Nigeria's nationalization of British Petroleum
Author:	Genova, Ann
Year:	2010
Periodical:	International Journal of African Historical Studies (ISSN 0361-7882)
Volume:	43
Issue:	1
Pages:	115-136
Language:	English
Geographic term:	Nigeria
Subjects:	nationalization hydrocarbon policy oil companies
External link:	https://www.jstor.org/stable/25741399
Abstract:	On 30 July 1979, the managing director of the Nigerian National Petroleum Company (NNPC) on behalf of Nigeria's military leader, General Olusegun Obasanjo, dispatched a telegram to BP (Nigeria) Ltd. stating that Nigeria intended to 'increase its participation to 100 percent' in Shell-BP and BP (Nigeria). He went on to say that the decision stemmed from the UK's proposed change in policy favouring the resumption of oil supplies to apartheid South Africa. However, there is little agreement in subsequent journalists' and scholars' reports over why Nigeria 'nationalized' BP. Some mention South Africa, others Southern Rhodesia (Zimbabwe), only a few identify oil as the central feature. Offering a revision of the popular narrative and providing a detailed chronology of events, the present paper argues that the nationalization of BP was part of a project of economic nationalism - an ideology to rally a population around a State-sponsored economic vision - in Nigeria. Notes, ref. [ASC Leiden abstract]