Complex and Distressed Mandates

We advise boards and shareholders on the restructuring of businesses under strategic or financial stress - redefining strategy, rebuilding leadership, resetting capital structure, and repositioning the business for recovery or sale.

Our principal served as Chief Executive of a publicly listed energy company appointed specifically to execute a turnaround: redefining strategy, assembling new leadership, completing a dual-listing on European exchanges, acquiring upstream assets, and executing four capital raises across institutional and retail markets. That experience informs how we advise on turnaround mandates today.

The IOC divestment programme in West Africa is generating a large volume of asset sales where the seller needs a clean exit, the regulatory environment is complex, and the indigenous buyer needs fast, structured advisory to get the transaction across the line. These are not standard M&A processes. Price discovery is harder, completion risk is higher, and the gap between signing and ministerial consent is a deal risk in its own right.

We advise on both sides of these transactions. We understand the NUPRC consent process, the pre-emption mechanics in Nigerian PSCs, and the financing structures that indigenous operators need to support acquisition. We also advise sellers on how to design a process that achieves a clean exit rather than a prolonged negotiation.

We advise on transactions and capital-raising mandates in jurisdictions where political, regulatory, or counterparty risk requires specific expertise and, in some cases, a direct assessment of whether to proceed at all. Our geographic depth in West and Central Africa - including francophone jurisdictions operating under OHADA frameworks - means we can advise on the real risk environment rather than a textbook version of it.

This includes advising clients on whether a mandate should be accepted, restructured, or declined. Knowing when to walk away is part of the service.

Some operators cannot access the standard lender or investor universe - because the jurisdiction carries a premium, the asset is at an early stage of development, the credit profile is unconventional, or the financing structure required does not fit a commercial bank's credit committee. We raise capital for these clients by identifying the right part of the market: development finance institutions, specialist funds, structured credit providers, and alternative lenders with an appetite for African frontier risk.

We do not present these mandates as straightforward. We present them accurately and find investors who understand what they are buying.