Babalakin & Co

Senior Partner: Dr Bolanle Olawale Babalakin, SAN

Managing Partner: Olawale Adeola Akoni, SAN

Number of partners: 12

Number of lawyers: 70+

Languages: English

Firm Overview: Babalakin & Co. (B&C), established in July 1988, has grown into one of Nigeria’s foremost commercial law firms. With a team of over 70 lawyers operating from offices in Lagos, Abuja, and Port Harcourt, the firm remains accessible to a wide range of corporate and private clients, as well as government regulatory bodies and courtrooms across the country.

Structured as a partnership, B&C boasts 12 active partners, 5 of whom are Senior Advocates of Nigeria. Many of its lawyers hold additional professional qualifications relevant to the firm’s core areas of practice. Over the years, the firm has built extensive expertise and capacity in energy, oil and gas, corporate restructuring, venture capital and project finance, banking and securities, company secretarial services, data privacy and protection, corporate governance, joint ventures, taxation, foreign investments, and litigation and dispute resolution. The firm also handles intellectual property protection on behalf of its clients.

B&C has been involved in major, complex, and high-value commercial litigations and arbitrations in Nigeria, consistently delivering top-tier legal services in collaboration with its international partner firms. The firm’s strength lies in its experienced team of legal practitioners and chartered secretaries, professionals with high-quality legal education, enhanced by international continuous professional development programs, and supported by a dedicated administrative team.

Through its affiliate, Optimum Publishers Limited, publisher of the renowned Nigerian Monthly Law Reports, the firm ensures that its lawyers remain fully informed on evolving legal developments in the country. The cornerstone of B&C’s practice is a deep and broad-based understanding of Nigeria’s key economic sectors and awareness of global industry trends. The firm approaches every client instruction with commercial insight and proactivity, always seeking to add value and strengthen its clients’ businesses.

Over the years, the firm has maintained its leadership in the provision of premium legal services in Nigeria by delivering innovative, client-centred, and cost-effective legal solutions. It continues to build enduring professional relationships using advanced business tools and upholding the highest standards of professionalism, ethics, efficiency, and quality. This commitment ensures quick response times, consistent communication, and seamless accessibility, even for clients operating across different time zones.

B&C serves major foreign companies, multinationals, financial institutions, oil and gas companies, construction and property development firms, as well as high-net-worth individuals. The firm also represents federal and state governments and provides advisory services to key regulatory bodies and state-owned enterprises across various sectors, including energy, ports, land, foreign investment, and securities.

An active member of several chambers of commerce, such as the Nigerian-American Chamber of Commerce and the Franco-Nigerian Chamber of Commerce, the firm also operates an affiliate company, Amalgamated Nominees Limited, which handles company secretarial and corporate compliance services. B&C maintains a comprehensive professional indemnity insurance policy, underscoring its commitment to accountability and the confidence it has in the quality and integrity of its professional services.

Babalakin & Co offers services to major multinationals in diverse sectors of the economy including local and foreign oil and gas companies, banking and other financial institutions, construction companies, government at federal and state levels, among others.Main Areas of Practice:

■ Corporate Finance, Banking & Securities

■ Corporate, Commercial & Compliance

■ Energy & Extractive Industry

■ Litigation & Dispute Resolution

■ Real Estate, Infrastructure & Construction

Recent Work:

■ Babalakin & Co. successfully represented one of the oil and gas majors in Nigeria in a high profile regulatory dispute against the Nigerian Maritime Administration and Safety Agency involving a sum in excess of $300,000,000.00 and a pronouncement on the constitutionality of a major gas statute

■ The firm also represented one of the top IOCs in Nigeria in a 40 billion naira compensation claim and represented Nigeria’s national oil corporation in matters relating to several arbitral proceedings involving a total of over $300,000,000.00. The firm also secured a 54,000,000,000.00 naira arbitral award against the Federal Government of Nigeria on behalf of a client arising from a breach of a major civil engineering project. The firm is currently handling the litigation seeking to enforce the award. The firm is representing a major oil and gas company in respect of a dispute relating to over a million barrels of oil. The firm also currently represents various clients in dispute with the Federal Government of Nigeria with a view to enforcing compliance with some watershed infrastructure concession agreements.

■ Babalakin & Co also collaborated with a leading English law firm in securing judgment for the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation before the Supreme Court of the United Kingdom in a case that highlighted important issues regarding the limits of an enforcing court’s power to order security under the New York Convention of 1958

■ Babalakin & Co. acted as one of the transaction firms in the successful merger and acquisition of one of the ‘bridge banks’ set up by the Asset Management Corporation of Nigeria and also acted as transaction counsel to the concessionaire of the Murtala Muhammed Airport Terminal 2 project involving about $250,000,000.00

Practice Area Contacts:

Litigation & Dispute Resolution:

Contact: Mobolaji Kuti

Tel: +234 1 270 6831

Email: [email protected]

Energy & Extractive Industry:

Contact: Dr Bayo Adaralegbe

Tel: +234 1 271 8710

Email: [email protected]

Corporate Finance, Banking & Securities:

Contact: Oyetola Oshobi, SAN

Tel: +234 1 270 2802

Email: [email protected]