Oil Tycoon, Festus Fadeyi Remains in His Cocoon

Festus Fadeyi’s name evokes a mixture of admiration, envy and respect in the nation’s oil and gas sector.

Fadeyi is not one of your run-off-the-mill businessmen. He is head and shoulders above several competitors in the industry.

He runs Pan Ocean Oil Corporation, a thriving oil exploration and production company in  Nigeria.

Sadly, he has had his own fair share of the challenges of doing business in the country.

For two years, Fadeyi battled with a myriad of troubles. His headache then was not unconnected with the Assets Management Corporation of Nigeria (AMCON) which was said to have taken over his company’s assets and those of its subsidiaries over huge bank loans that led to the death of a Nigerian bank.

A report by some independent auditors revealed that Fadeyi, via his Pan Ocean Group, cumulatively secured a total of more than N240 billion (almost half of the total debt of defunct Skye Bank), thus making him the most heavily indebted entity to the bank.

Fadeyi, through Pan Ocean, allegedly took the loans considered one of the biggest loan portfolios in the country to fund the firm’s oil and gas upstream projects operated under Joint Operating Agreements and Production Sharing Contracts with and on behalf of the Nigerian National Petroleum Company (NNPC).

Although the matter was resolved when an agreement for the debt settlement was reached by the warring parties.

“Pan Ocean received funding from a number of banks in Nigeria to execute specific business expansion projects, which are well documented and domiciled in Nigeria.

However, the vagaries of the crude oil market made the timelines for the settlement of funding partners linger. We are mindful of our obligations,” Fadeyi’s oil firm wrote then.

Since the ugly development, he has recoiled back to his cocoon and is no longer visible in the social circle, our source said.