Nigeria secures $600 million Maersk investment in seaport infrastructure

ABUJA (Reuters) - Nigeria secured a $600 million investment in seaport infrastructure from Danish shipping company A.P. Moller-Maersk, the presidency said in a statement on Sunday.

The investment was secured during a meeting between President Bola Tinubu and Moller-Maersk Chairman Robert Maersk Uggla on the sidelines of a World Economic Forum meeting in Saudi Arabia.

"We believe in Nigeria, and we will invest $600 million in existing facilities and make the ports accommodating for bigger ships," the Nigerian presidency quoted Uggla as saying during the meeting.

Nigeria has promised to revamp its ports, including in the commercial capital Lagos, to ease congestion that frustrates businesses.

Tinubu said during the meeting that his government would support the modernisation and automation of its ports to improve trade, reduce corruption and boost efficiency.

"A bet on Nigeria is a winning bet. It is also a bet that rewards beyond what is obtainable elsewhere," he said. "We need to encourage more opportunities for revenue expansion and minimize trans-shipments from larger ships to smaller ships."

(Reporting by Felix Onuah in Abuja and Kanjyik Ghosh in Bengalulu, Writing by MacDonald Dzirutwe; Editing by Lisa Shumaker and Matthew Lewis)