Nigeria's Seplat Wins Deadline Extension For Afren Takeover

SAN FRANCISCO, January 19, (THEWILL) – Nigeria's Seplat Petroleum Development Company has won an extension to a deadline for announcing whether it intends to make a firm offer for oil producer Afren, the London-listed firm said on Monday.

Seplat confirmed earlier this month that it had made a preliminary approach to take over Afren and that it faced a Jan. 19 deadline to firm up the deal.

“The board of the company has received the consent of the UK Takeover Panel for an extension to the deadline until 1700 GMT on 30 January 2015 to enable the parties to continue their ongoing discussions,” Afren said in a statement.

Seplat, which lost out on the assets that Shell divested in October, has been on the hunt for acquisitions in Nigeria, encouraged by falling oil prices.

Afren has been plagued by high-level corruption that resulted in the dismissal of its founder and chief executive, as well as a recent slashing of resource estimates at a Kurdistan oilfield.

REUTERS