Niger Delta Militants Strike Chevron Again as Nigeria Risks Losing Oil Market to Iran

Following the incessant production outages and force majeure declared on exports of some grades of Nigerian crude oil, which have created supply uncertainty to the major buyers of Nigeria’s crude oil, mostly foreign refineries, the refineries from India to the United States are backing away from buying Nigerian oil and turning to Iran and other Middle East countries for sustainable crude oil supply.

The uncertainty about deliveries of Nigerian crude to the foreign buyers due to supply disruptions has heightened in recent months as the country squares up to the new militant group in the Niger Delta, the Niger Delta Avengers (NDA), which wednesday claimed it had struck Chevron-operated RMP 20 Well at Didi community in Egbema, Warri North Local Government area of Delta State.

Force majeure is a legal clause that allows crude oil producers to stop exports and cancel deliveries to customers without breaching contracts by citing unforeseen circumstances.

Shell, ExxonMobil and Nigerian Agip Oil Company (NAOC) have invoked this clause in recent weeks to avoid contractual obligations to customers who were denied supplies

The lack of guarantee of steady supply of Nigerian crude by the IOCs has fuelled the reluctance of foreign buyers to buy Nigerian crude.

It is feared that with this development, the country may risk losing some of its customers to other rival producers, particularly Iran.