By: Kebba Ansu Manneh
The Government of The Gambia has firmly defended its decision to award an offshore petroleum exploration license for Block A1 to Eni Gambia Ltd, a subsidiary of Italian energy major Eni S.p.A., insisting that the company was subjected to a comprehensive due diligence process covering its litigation history, environmental record and anti-corruption arrangements.
The award, signed on 5 June 2026 as a Petroleum Exploration, Development and Production License Agreement, grants Eni rights over approximately 1,300 square kilometers of deepwater acreage in water depths of 1,250 to 3,300 meters along The Gambia’s Atlantic margin. It is Eni’s first entry into the country and the most significant upstream commitment since BP left the same block in 2021 without drilling a well.
The decision has drawn scrutiny because of Eni’s long-running legal battles. In 2011, Eni and Shell paid $1.3 billion to acquire Nigeria’s OPL 245 offshore field. Italian prosecutors later described the transaction as one of the oil industry’s largest corruption cases, alleging that just under $1.1 billion was diverted to politicians and middlemen, including former oil minister Dan Etete and Malabu Oil and Gas. A Milan court acquitted Eni, its then-CEO Claudio Descalzi and other defendants in March 2021, finding there was no case to answer. Those acquittals became final after prosecutors waived an appeal in 2022.
Separately, Eni and its former Nigerian subsidiary, Nigerian Agip Oil Company (NAOC), now linked to Oando, have faced civil action in Milan brought by the Aggah community in Rivers State over decades of flooding that residents attribute to oil infrastructure, including raised roads and embankments. A Milan court dismissed the community’s claims for further remediation and compensation in April 2026, holding that specified works under a 2019 settlement had been completed. The community has appealed.
Responding to questions from (TAT), Cany Jobe Taal, Director General of the Gambia Petroleum Commission, said the government required Eni to answer a formal request for information on its corporate, financial, technical and compliance profile before negotiations advanced. The evaluation, she said, considered the totality of available information rather than any single case.
“The Government noted that Eni and its management were acquitted of all charges in the OPL 245 proceedings before the Court of Milan, and that those acquittals subsequently became final,” she said. “The Government’s decision ultimately reflected its assessment of the company’s ability to undertake exploration activities in The Gambia, its extensive global operating experience, its current legal standing, financial and technical capacity, and the contractual, regulatory and statutory safeguards available under Gambian law.”
Jobe Taal emphasized that operations in The Gambia will be governed by Gambian law and internationally accepted industry standards that apply equally to all operators. Environmental protection, she explained, operates at three levels: national environmental legislation that covers all petroleum operations; binding license obligations requiring environmental assessments, management plans, ongoing monitoring, biodiversity protection and decommissioning provisions; and independent oversight by the Petroleum Commission, the National Environment Agency and other competent authorities, including rights of audit and enforcement.
“The Government requires all operators to meet both Gambian legal requirements and internationally accepted industry standards in environmental protection, safety and operational performance. Those requirements are not aspirational. They are enforceable obligations under Gambian law and the license,” she said.
On financial terms, the Commission confirmed that the agreement is a concessionary license based on the government’s publicly available 2022 Model Petroleum Exploration, Development and Production License, not a production-sharing contract. All exploration work is at the licensee’s sole risk and expense. The license contains firm exploration obligations, including drilling commitments. Deepwater programs of this type typically involve tens of millions of dollars in investment. The government holds a participating interest that is carried through the exploration phase, meaning the state bears no exploration costs. Officials have separately indicated a 10 percent carried interest to be assigned to the Gambia National Petroleum Corporation, with an option for a further 5 percent if a commercial discovery is made.
She stressed that the license remains subject to conditions precedent and has not yet become effective. Detailed commercial terms will be released in accordance with applicable law and the license once it takes effect. An Environmental Impact Assessment for Block A1 will be conducted at the appropriate operational stage.
Block A1 has a chequered history. African Petroleum’s license was revoked in 2017. BP later held the acreage but exited after a settlement over unmet drilling commitments. Authorities reopened the block and selected Eni after a process that included data-room access, pre-qualification and negotiations. Officials have been careful to describe the signing as the start of structured scientific assessment rather than a discovery.
The Commission said it will monitor compliance with anti-corruption, anti-bribery and anti-money-laundering clauses throughout the life of the license, with remedies available to the government in the event of a breach. Whether those contractual and statutory safeguards prove sufficient will be tested as Eni moves from paper commitments toward seismic work and, eventually, drilling in one of West Africa’s more closely watched frontier deepwater plays.
For a small country that has seen successive operators leave without a commercial well, the Eni award represents both an opportunity and a political risk. The government has chosen to treat the Italian major’s final Italian acquittal and its technical capacity as decisive. Critics will continue to point to the unresolved environmental dispute in the Niger Delta and the reputational shadow of OPL 245. The Commission answers that Gambian law, not foreign courtrooms, will govern what happens next offshore.
