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The World Bank Group’s International Finance Corporation has announced a $70m investment in First City Monument Bank (FCMB) to support its growth strategy and help it increase financing of small and medium enterprises.

Oil and gas minister Abdulrahman Ben Yezza has reassured striking workers at Sirte Oil Company (SOC)’s Brega complex that the government will do what it takes to bring the security situation there under control.

The Climate Investment Funds (CIF) has approved a $21.7m facility to finance development of the Ngozi geothermal steam field in south-west Tanzania, eventually adding up to 823GWh/yr to the grid. The $5m loan and $16.73m grant come from the CIF’s Scaling-up Renewable Energy Programme. Tanzania has around 15 geothermal sites with an untapped estimated potential of 650MW, and Ngozi is planned as a showcase for the technology. Exploratory test drilling will be conducted and steam-gathering infrastructure installed at the Ngozi site.

With further progress in its electricity privatisation, increased food production due to investment in agriculture, and capital markets responding favourably to banks and bonds, it is easy to be drawn into the bubble of optimism that has built up around the Nigerian economy and its prospects. Away from the conflict zones of the north and Niger Delta, real progress has been made, but for every bit of positive newsflow there is a reality check, such as a new report from the Royal Institute of International Affairs (Chatham House) which examines illegal oil exports – a still little understood cog in the machine of money and power-broking that defines public life in Nigeria.

The African Development Bank (AfDB) board has approved funding for the 33MW Segou Solar photovoltaic (PV) project, Mali’s first utility-scale solar PV power plant (AE 305/8). The project will be funded by the Program for Scaling Up Renewable Energy in Low Income Countries (Srep), part of the multi-donor Climate Investment Funds. In addition to the $25m Srep tranche, the AfDB and International Finance Corporation are each putting in $8.4m of senior debt.

With its energy loan book already at record levels, the African Development Bank has granted $68m for the Inga Site Development and Electricity Access Support Project. This aims to bring the 4,800MW Inga 3 project to bankability with professional services, capacity building to allow for coherent decisions about developers, and creation of a good environment for public/private partnerships. The bank has identified shortfalls in project preparation as a key challenge to completing privately financed infrastructure schemes, even in states less fragile than Democratic Republic of Congo.

Rwanda and Uganda are the first East African countries to become members of the Africa Finance Corporation (AFC), which aims to bring together governments and private stakeholders to mobilise funds for infrastructure projects. Rwanda, which signed the AFC’s instrument of accession and acceptance of membership on 4 November, and Uganda, which signed on 6 November, bring the total members to 13. AFC’s other members are Cape Verde, Chad, Côte d’Ivoire, Gabon, Gambia, Ghana, Guinea-Bissau, Guinea, Liberia, Nigeria and Sierra Leone.

South Sudan’s crude production in the first half of July was estimated at 160,000-165,000 b/d, according to industry sources. Sources in Juba have confirmed that Chinese oil workers were evacuated in May from key oilfields in South Sudan’s only producing state, Upper Nile, but any downturn in oil production was shortlived. Current output is slightly higher than the H1 average.On 8 July, Sinopec subsidiary China International United Petroleum & Chemicals (Unipec) won the contract for a cargo of 1m barrels of Dar Blend crude for loading at Port Sudan between 15 and 17 August.

Tullow Oil has slashed 2020 spending and announced plans to cut its workforce by a third as it reported a 2019 loss of $1.69bn, compared to an $85m profit in 2018. Already under pressure due to lower than anticipated production in Ghana and delays in farming down part of its stake in Uganda, the company has been hard hit by the sharp drop in the oil price in recent days.

ConocoPhillips has had another disappointment in the Kwanza Basin with the Omosi-1 well on Block 37. The company said the well had been drilled to 6,300 metres total depth and had encountered a 160 metre gas column. No further activity is planned, and the well has been plugged and abandoned. After Cobalt’s big Cameia discovery on Block 21 in February 2012 and Maersk’s smaller 2011 Azul find on Block 23, there were high hopes for the Kwanza Basin. Angola had hoped the pre-salt play would deliver the same success as on the other side of the Atlantic, but it has not been an unqualified success.

The escalation of the euro crisis has added to concerns about Francophone African risk, although risk perceptions and pricing remain stable for now. There has already been an impact on trade finance availability and, as the Eurozone crisis unfolds, it may become harder still to source bilateral and commercial finance, writes Kevin Godier

Finance minister Calle Schlettwein is caught between debt concerns and political pressures as he argues the case against developing the Kudu gas field in a debate that has pitted the ruling Swapo party’s patronage networks against financial prudence.Following mines and energy minister Obeth Kandjoze’s decision in June to cancel the Xaris standby power plant as a result of a doubling in the price tag, President Hage Geingob tasked Schlettwein to find a solution to a projected 250MW shortfall in electricity supply in 2016.

Kenya’s Mombasa refinery has secured its short-term future with a $250m working capital loan to support its transformation from a tolling refinery to a merchant one, writes Kimemia Mugo in Nairobi

AfDB – first private equity investment in Maghreb; CADF $90m for four projects; US EX-IM Sub-Saharan Africa Advisory Committee

African Petroleum has raised $3.1m in a private placement on the Oslo Axess junior market.The placement raised NOK26,675,000 in gross proceeds through the allocation of 10,670,000 shares at a subscription price of NOK2.50/share.African Petroleum chief executive Jens Pace said the proceeds would be used to strengthen the company’s balance sheet and liquidity position while it works towards completing farm-out transactions:“The proceeds will also help us prepare for the exciting and approaching spudding of the exploration well with Ophir Energy in Q2 2017 on the CI-513 Block in Côte d’Ivoire.