The chief executive of French oil major Total said he would not deny a Bloomberg report that the firm was in talks to sell assets in Nigeria, worth about $2.4-billion, to China's Sinopec.
A Bloomberg report last week said Sinopec, Asia's largest refinery, was close to buying stakes in Nigerian onshore oil blocks from Total.
"Yes, we are discussing with certain buyers selling certain assets in Nigeria," said Total CEO Christophe de Margerie, declining to name the potential buyer or the value of the deal.
"But it doesn't mean we are scared and intend to start some kind of walking-out of Nigeria.
"Total is happy to develop its projects in Nigeria," he said at an energy conference in Abu Dhabi.
Nigeria is Africa's biggest crude oil exporter and oil companies operating there have long had to deal with attacks on their pipelines and staff. The country's worst floods in 50 years seriously affected output in recent weeks.
Total said in September that it planned to sell assets worth between $15-billion and $20-billion by 2014 as part of a bolder approach to managing its business.
Total declared force majeure in mid-October on gas supplies to Nigeria LNG's liquefaction plant, saying it had stopped oil and gas production on onshore block 58, which was losing 90000 barrels a day of oil equivalent, in which it has a 40% stake.
Total's head of upstream products said at the press conference in Abu Dhabi that it was still too early to say when production might restart, with flooding still posing problems.
At least 363 people have been killed due to the floods since the start of July and 2.1million people have been displaced, according to Nigeria's National Emergency Management Agency.
The oil-producing Niger Delta region is still flooded but the dry season is beginning.
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