Global port operator APM Terminals has pledged a $600 million investment in Nigeria’s maritime sector, targeting the modernisation of Apapa Port, expansion of logistics infrastructure, and long-term private sector participation in the country’s port industry. The commitment was announced during a meeting between the company’s senior executives and President Bola Tinubu on the sidelines of the 13th Africa CEO Forum in Kigali, Rwanda, on May 14, 2026. The investment builds on more than two decades of APM Terminals operations in Nigeria and cumulative spending exceeding $600 million at Apapa alone since the company took over its concession in 2006. The announcement came alongside a separate pledge by the International Finance Corporation to dispatch a mission to Nigeria exploring investment opportunities in housing, energy, and livestock, as well as meetings with Winme Group executives focused on logistics and mining partnerships.
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Key Overview
- Investment amount: $600 million pledged by APM Terminals for Nigeria’s maritime sector
- Focus areas: Apapa Port modernisation, logistics infrastructure expansion, and technology-driven terminal operations
- Announced at: 13th Africa CEO Forum, Kigali Convention Centre, Rwanda, May 14, 2026
- APM delegation led by: Igor van den Essen, Regional President for Africa-Europe; Martijn Van Dongen, Head of Investments; Frederik Klinke, CEO of APM Terminals Nigeria
- Existing investment: Over $600 million invested in Apapa since 2006, plus $115 million in the WACT terminal upgrade at Onne
- IFC commitment: Plans to send a mission to Nigeria for scalable investment in energy, housing, and livestock
- National Single Window: Launched March 27, 2026, and praised by APM Terminals for improving customs coordination
The $600 Million Commitment
APM Terminals, one of the world’s largest port operators, has pledged a fresh $600 million investment in Nigeria’s maritime sector, in what represents one of the most significant foreign direct investment commitments to the country’s port industry in recent years. The announcement was made on Thursday, May 14, during a high-level meeting between the company’s executives and President Bola Tinubu, held on the sidelines of the ongoing Africa CEO Forum in Kigali, Rwanda.
The APM Terminals delegation was led by Igor van den Essen, the company’s Regional President for Africa-Europe, and included Martijn Van Dongen, Head of Investments, and Frederik Klinke, CEO of APM Terminals Nigeria. Van den Essen disclosed that the proposed investment would be deployed across the modernisation of Apapa Port, expansion of logistics infrastructure, enhancement of cargo handling capacity, and the development of technology-driven terminal operations.
He described the investment as part of APM Terminals’ long-term strategic commitment to Nigeria and its determination to support the country’s ambition of becoming a major maritime and logistics hub on the African continent. Van den Essen called Nigeria a strategic stronghold within the company’s African operations, referencing over 20 years of collaboration and substantial existing investments in the country’s port ecosystem.
Presidential spokesperson Bayo Onanuga, in a statement confirming the commitment, quoted President Tinubu as welcoming the investment and emphasising that Nigeria is repositioning itself for greater global competitiveness through ongoing economic reforms and infrastructure modernisation.
Tinubu’s Response and Reform Agenda
President Tinubu used the meeting to outline his administration’s vision for transforming Nigeria’s maritime sector. He stressed that the country is determined to move beyond structural bottlenecks and outdated systems, calling for advanced technology, faster cargo processing, and improved operational efficiency across the nation’s ports.
The president positioned Nigeria as prime investment territory, arguing that the country possesses the market scale, talent base, and economic potential to support globally competitive maritime and logistics infrastructure. He urged other international investors to take advantage of the reform outcomes his administration has been delivering since taking office in May 2023.
Tinubu’s broader reform agenda — which has included the removal of fuel subsidies and the unification of the foreign exchange rate — has drawn praise from multilateral institutions and international investors at the forum. These reforms, though domestically contentious, have been credited with improving investor confidence and opening new possibilities for foreign capital inflows into critical infrastructure sectors.
Van den Essen echoed this sentiment, stating that the Tinubu administration’s policy direction had strengthened investor confidence and created renewed momentum for long-term infrastructure investments. He specifically praised the establishment of the National Single Window initiative, saying it had streamlined trade procedures, improved customs coordination, and reduced delays in cargo clearance.
APM Terminals’ Two-Decade Footprint in Nigeria
The $600 million pledge is not APM Terminals’ first major bet on Nigeria. The company has maintained an extensive operational presence in the country since it took over the concession for the Apapa Container Terminal in Lagos in 2006. Since then, APM Terminals has invested a cumulative total exceeding $600 million in terminal expansion at Apapa alone and remitted more than $1.5 billion to the Federal Government through concession fees and taxes.
The Apapa terminal, Nigeria’s largest container facility, has a capacity of one million twenty-foot equivalent units (TEUs) and operates around the clock with 13 mobile harbour cranes and 27 rubber-tyred gantries. It is the only container terminal in Nigeria with a direct rail link to other parts of the country, an asset that has become increasingly important as the government pushes multimodal transport to ease road congestion around Lagos port areas.
In 2025, APM Terminals Apapa recorded its strongest-ever monthly export throughput, handling 8,687 TEUs of export cargo in April alone — a 31.5 percent year-on-year increase. Rail operations between Apapa and the Moniya inland depot were expanded to three weekly services during the year, with a further extension to Ebutte Meta in late 2025 enabling faster cargo movement for businesses across multiple Lagos districts.
Beyond Apapa, the company operates the West Africa Container Terminal (WACT) at Onne in Rivers State. In September 2024, Vice President Kashim Shettima inaugurated a $115 million upgrade at the WACT facility, which nearly doubled the terminal’s yard space and introduced new mobile harbour cranes, rubber tyre gantries, a 1MW solar power facility, and an advanced auto gate system. The upgrade positioned Onne as an increasingly important trade gateway for eastern, north-eastern, and central Nigeria. APM Terminals also operates an inland container depot in Kano, which connects businesses in northern Nigeria directly to international trade routes, offering through bill of lading products and warehousing tailored to the region’s agricultural export potential.
Combined, APM Terminals’ Nigerian operations handle roughly half of all containerised trade entering and leaving the country, giving the company an outsized role in the country’s trade logistics chain.
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The National Single Window: A Turning Point for Trade
A significant factor behind APM Terminals’ renewed confidence appears to be Nigeria’s launch of the National Single Window platform, a centralised electronic portal designed to unify the processing of trade-related documentation across multiple government agencies.
The platform went live on March 27, 2026, after years of failed attempts at implementation dating back to the late 2000s. President Tinubu had commissioned the project in April 2024 and personally inaugurated the steering committee, appointing the Federal Inland Revenue Service and the Nigeria Sovereign Investment Authority as lead implementing agencies.
The system is designed to eliminate the longstanding fragmentation of Nigeria’s trade administration, where importers and exporters previously had to navigate separately between the Nigeria Customs Service, the Standards Organisation of Nigeria, the National Agency for Food and Drug Administration and Control, and numerous other regulatory bodies. Under the new system, traders submit documentation once through a single electronic interface, with data shared automatically among participating agencies.
The reform is aimed at addressing an estimated $4 billion in annual losses linked to port red tape and bureaucratic delays, with the initiative expected to deliver approximately $2.7 billion in annual economic benefits once fully operational. Van den Essen described the National Single Window as a transformative policy capable of significantly improving trade efficiency and reducing bottlenecks within Nigeria’s maritime sector.
The Africa CEO Forum: A Platform for Investment Deals
The APM Terminals announcement was one of several investment commitments emerging from the 13th Africa CEO Forum, held on May 14 and 15 at the Kigali Convention Centre. Founded in 2012 by Jeune Afrique Media Group and co-hosted by the International Finance Corporation, the forum has grown into one of Africa’s largest annual private sector gatherings, attracting over 2,500 CEOs, heads of state, ministers, and investors from more than 70 countries.
This year’s edition was held under the theme “The Scale Imperative: Why Africa Must Embrace Shared Ownership,” with discussions focused on cross-border cooperation, shared investment models, and building continental-scale African enterprises capable of competing globally. The forum has facilitated more than $1 billion in investment commitments over the last two editions through agreements involving governments, development finance institutions, and private sector leaders.
Several African heads of state attended, including Presidents Paul Kagame of Rwanda, Bola Ahmed Tinubu of Nigeria, and leaders from Gabon, Mauritania, Mozambique, and Guinea. The high-level presence underscored the growing importance of the event as a platform for public-private dialogue and deal-making on the continent.
IFC Promises Mission to Nigeria
In a separate engagement at the forum, the International Finance Corporation announced plans to immediately dispatch a mission to Nigeria to explore scalable investment structures capable of unlocking private capital in housing, energy, and livestock production.
IFC Managing Director Makhtar Diop, who led a delegation including Regional Vice President for Africa Ethiopis Tafara and Director for Central Africa and Nigeria Dahlia Khalifa, praised Tinubu’s reform programme as courageous and transformative. He noted that the IFC was advancing a public-private partnership infrastructure pipeline to help address what he described as Nigeria’s $14 billion annual urban infrastructure gap.
Diop also suggested that local currency financing structures and banking partnerships involving Nigerian financial institutions, such as Access Bank, could strengthen interstate financial integration and boost cross-continental trade. He urged African leaders to collectively pursue what he described as an “African Renaissance” anchored in strong institutions and regional economic champions.
President Tinubu responded by reaffirming Nigeria’s openness to private capital for institutional development. He argued that African pension funds must evolve into strategic development finance instruments capable of supporting major infrastructure investments, and called for the mobilisation of African institutional capital to finance energy transitions and long-term economic transformation.
Winme Group and Broader Investment Talks
The forum also saw President Tinubu meet with executives of Winme Group, where discussions centred on deeper investment partnerships across logistics, mining, shipping, and integrated infrastructure development. Tinubu stressed the need for connected investments linking ports, transport systems, processing facilities, and export infrastructure to drive industrial growth and strengthen Nigeria’s competitiveness. The Winme Group delegation expressed confidence in Nigeria’s long-term investment potential, citing the administration’s ongoing economic reforms as a key driver of their interest.
The Bigger Picture for Nigerian Ports
The flurry of investment commitments in Kigali reflects a growing recognition that Nigeria’s port infrastructure has lagged behind its economic potential for decades. As Africa’s most populous nation and largest economy, Nigeria handles substantial volumes of containerised trade, yet persistent congestion at Apapa, inadequate draft depth at many berths, poor road connections, and bureaucratic cargo clearance processes have long driven up the cost of doing business and undermined the country’s competitiveness relative to regional peers.
APM Terminals has previously highlighted the potential for port electrification to generate additional investment. A white paper co-published by the company and Systemiq estimated that Nigeria could mobilise up to $830 million in investments by 2030 through port electrification alone, creating skilled jobs while cutting greenhouse gas emissions by 390,000 tonnes. The company already operates solar-powered facilities at WACT in Onne and has signalled that electrification will be central to the next phase of logistics modernisation across its Nigerian terminals.
Whether the $600 million pledge translates into the transformative infrastructure upgrades Nigeria needs will depend on execution, regulatory follow-through, and the sustained policy consistency that investors like APM Terminals have said they need. But for now, the commitment signals that international capital continues to see value in Nigeria’s maritime future, provided the reforms keep moving.
Sources: P.M. News Nigeria / THISDAY Live / The Guardian Nigeria / The Sun Nigeria / The Will News / Premium Times Nigeria / Economy Post / Nigerian Tribune / TheStar Nigeria / Business Post Nigeria / TheCable / Channels Television / Ships & Ports / Seatrade Maritime / The Maritime Executive / Port Technology International / Container News / CNBC Africa / Mondaq / PRNigeria / allAfrica / Top Africa News / Pan African Visions / Indiplomacy / The New Times Rwanda / APM Terminals / IFC / Africa CEO Forum
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