By Gift ChapiOdekina, Abuja 

Nigeria LNG Limited (NLNG) has marked the end of the tenure of its Managing Director and Chief Executive Officer, Philip Mshelbila, who will be exiting the company after more than four years in office.

Mshelbila is scheduled to leave NLNG on December 31, 2025, to assume the position of Secretary-General of the Gas Exporting Countries Forum (GECF) in Doha, Qatar.

Following the approval of the NLNG Board of Directors, Engr. Adeleye Falade has been appointed as the company’s new Managing Director/Chief Executive Officer. Falade, who is currently the Managing Director/CEO of Brunei LNG, is expected to assume duties at NLNG in April 2026.

The send-off ceremony which took place in Abuja was attended by NLNG directors, executives of shareholder companies, dignitaries from Nigeria’s public sector and energy industry, members of NLNG management, and representatives of various staff groups.

In his remarks, NLNG’s Deputy Managing Director, Olakunle Osobu, described Mshelbila as “a man of distinction and an accomplished professional,” whose expertise spans medicine, environmental health, strategic business leadership and global gas diplomacy.

Osobu noted that Mshelbila assumed leadership at a period marked by unprecedented challenges, including the aftermath of COVID-19, severe flooding that disrupted gas pipelines, vandalism, force majeure declarations by suppliers, and global energy turbulence following the Russia–Ukraine war.

Despite these difficulties, he said Mshelbila remained focused on business sustainability, operational diversification, emissions control and safety. According to him, the outgoing MD championed a strategic expansion of NLNG’s feed-gas base beyond the shareholder joint-venture supply chain.

“Under his leadership, NLNG negotiated and signed long-term Gas Supply Agreements with six third-party gas suppliers in August 2025, committing an estimated 1,290 million standard cubic feet per day of feed-gas to NLNG. This marked a historic and seismic shift for the company,” Osobu said.

He added that Mshelbila drove innovation through a forward-looking transformation programme, strengthening the company’s environmental stewardship and laying the foundation for future sustainability and value creation.

Also paying tribute, NLNG’s General Manager, External Relations and Sustainable Development, Sophia Horsfall, praised Mshelbila’s leadership style and vision.

“Thank you for your selflessness, for the steadiness of your leadership, for the clarity of your vision, and for the values that guided your every step. You led with humility, yet you inspired greatness,” Horsfall said.

In his response, Mshelbila expressed gratitude to NLNG’s shareholders, Board of Directors, staff and industry partners for their support during his tenure. He commended the company’s culture of innovation and excellence, noting that these values would guide him in his new role at GECF.

As Secretary-General of the GECF, Mshelbila said he would work to strengthen dialogue between gas-producing and gas-consuming nations, while promoting natural gas as a sustainable and reliable energy source.