Having made huge inroads into British offshore oil and gas industry through the provision of logistics and other services to the industry, UK trained Nigerian/British Engineer, Echendu Ndubuisi Endy, opens up on his upcoming Nigeria office and plans for the Nigerian market.
Your Nigerian office in Port Harcourt will be opening in the coming months and Nigerians are excited that one of their own is returning home to boost the economy. Can you please shed more light into what Echendu Oli and Gas is into generally?
Our plan is to open up the Nigerian market by first of all starting off our Port Harcourt office and being able to build our warehouses and workshops. That is what we have in mind. But talking about oil and gas for now, our major work actually, we are into oil drilling, both onshore and offshore. We also supply oil drilling tools to many oil and gas companies. We are into different oil and gas services and I can assure you that Echendu Oil and Gas is coming to help give Nigerian economy the much needed face lift and support at a time like this when our government is craving for more local content to be integrated into the economy.
Nigeria is currently going through rough patches economically; does that really give you cause for worry as an investor?
Basically we want to fully establish in Nigeria. We don’t really know fully what the situation is now in the country but we are positive that things will pick up in the coming months. We are trying to be able to come into the market and see what it offers. We are praying that all things work according to our plans so that pretty soon we can get into the market.
Shell and Chevron are known to be the leading international Oil and Gas companies in Africa. Looking at Nigeria with her large market, how will Echendu Oil and gas leverage on the presence of Shell and Chevron?
We are talking to Shell and Chevron. We are opposite Shell and we would like to have deals with them since we are a new company in Nigeria. We believe such collaboration will surely be of mutual benefit to both Shell and Echendu Oil and Gas. We are not new in the business, so coming to Nigeria is expected to be a good omen for us as we intend to pick up fast in the market.
You are much aware of demands from local communities. What are those things in the pipelines for these communities in terms of social amenities?
In terms of social amenities, I want to state clearly here that we have lots of plans in terms of social amenities for the community where we will be operating from. As a young man, there was a time in my life I had to go through it all. I have always longed to offer good jobs to youths. I have a vision of running a foundation for men and women whose children are struggling to get to the top. We have the schools and other stuff around and all of these need our support to keep lives going. It is a thing we have to go about gradually, it is a thing I have to do.
Finally, one must commend your courage for opting to start-up from Nigeria instead of Ghana, indeed charity does really begin at home.
Yeah! Coming to Nigeria to launch is all about respect for my country. I have respect for this great nation that has continued to move in the face of recession. Coming back to Africa, we got a license to launch in Ghana but I said it is important I respect my country Nigeria. We will start up from there before we are able to launch a branch in Ghana. Nigeria will be our main base for Africa and we will take on from there.