West African energy firm, Conex Oil and Gas Holdings, has acquired Liberia and Sierra Leone businesses of global energy giant TotalEnergies for an undisclosed sum.

Conex Oil and Gas will now rename the TotalEnergies’ two marketing and services businesses, Total Liberia and Total Sierra Leone, as Conex Oil & Gas Liberia and Conex Oil & Gas Sierra Leone respectively.

These two subsidiaries of TotalEnergies in Liberia and Sierra Leone are leaders in the importation and marketing of petroleum products throughout their respective countries via the industrial and wholesale channel under the trademarks pertaining to the TotalEnergies company.

This acquisition offers a unique opportunity for Conex Oil and Gas to become a ‘market leader’ in the African fuel marketing business with major activities in the Mano River Union due to Conex leading positions as vendors of petroleum products in the industry.

TotalEnergies has been operating in Liberia since 2005, and remained the leading provider of petroleum products to the country’s aviation industry. Prior to the completion of the transfer of rights of ownership for these assets in the country, the company had approximately 30 service stations in operation.

The Sale of Assets part of TotalEnergies Divestment Plans

According to Total Energies, the acquisition of the two assets in the two countries consist of a network of 63 service stations, general trade fuel sales and petroleum products import and storage operations.

A release quoting the Conex chairman and CEO Cherif Abdallah said: “Conex is prepared for expansion activities in the region, which will create jobs and promote development in the areas which Conex intends to expand. Our hope is that this acquisition will encourage development in the private sector in the Mano River Union.”

The acquisition forms part of Conex’s expansion strategy. The sale agreement was signed in March 2020, although TotalEnergies announced the sale in 2019. During the sale agreement last year, conex Oil and Gas was cited to have said that it will maintain the same source and quality of product, as well as the same management and staff.

At the time, Total chief financial officer Jean-Pierre Sbraire said that the sale of the assets would contribute to the firm’s divestment programme and as oil prices remained low, “these transactions support the action plan announced to weather the crisis,” he said.

This asset sale is in line with TotalEnergies’ strategy of managing its asset portfolio and a part of a total divestment objective of US$5 billion planned for 2019 to 2020.

Last month, it was reported TotalEnergies was looking to divest a third of its 60% stake in the Laggan Tormore gas field in the UK North Sea.

Over the past few years, TotalEnergies has embarked on this divestment drive in an effort to reduce greenhouse gas emissions from its operations. As a result, TotalEnergies seeks to shift towards renewables and low-carbon energy.