APPO Secretary General Ghezali Brings African Energy Bank Momentum to MSGBC
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Farid Ghezali, Secretary General of the African Petroleum Producers' Organization (APPO), will speak at the MSGBC Oil, Gas & Power 2026 conference, taking place December 1-3 in Dakar, Senegal. His participation brings the full institutional weight of Africa's 18-nation petroleum body to the basin, where multibillion-dollar gas developments, frontier exploration campaigns and new financing mechanisms are converging simultaneously.
Ghezali assumed office in January 2026, bringing more than three decades of upstream and commercial experience to the role. A chemical engineer by training, with a degree in LNG engineering from the Algerian Petroleum Institute, he previously served as Vice President for Strategy at Algeria's state-owned oil and gas company Sonatrach and as Director of Operations at In Salah Gas Services in The Hague.
His tenure at APPO has been defined by the push to operationalize the African Energy Bank (AEB), the continent's first oil-and-gas-focused development finance institution. Established with an initial capitalization of $5 billion, the AEB is targeting $10 billion in Phase 1 deployments and aims to begin operations in Abuja in September 2026. Nigeria handed over the bank's headquarters to APPO and the African Export-Import Bank (Afreximbank) in February, and as of May had raised 91% of the initial $500 million start-up capital.
The AEB is designed to fill the financing gap left by the retreat of Western lenders from African upstream projects. More than 150 oil and gas projects across the continent remain stalled due to capital shortfalls, according to APPO, and the bank's mandate spans the full value chain from exploration to downstream distribution. The Secretary General has also emphasized the bank's potential to support national oil company (NOC) listings and to unify intra-African oil and gas pricing, with APPO projecting savings of up to 30% on energy imports across member states.
With GTA Phase 1’s delivery of first LNG, Senegal's Sangomar field surpassing 50 million barrels produced and Mauritania's BirAllah field seeking a new operator, the MSGBC basin is moving from exploration milestones into a phase that demands new capital structures and development partnerships.
MSGBC Oil, Gas & Power 2026, organized under the theme Powering Investment, Delivering Prosperity: Executing the Region's Energy Strategy, will convene the region's governments, operators and investors to shape the financing and policy frameworks required by projects of this scale. Explore opportunities and secure your participation at msgbcoilgasandpower.com.