HOUSTON -- ConocoPhillips announced yesterday that it is raising more cash through another divestment out of Africa.

The company said it has entered into an agreement to sell off its Nigeria businesses for about $1.8 billion. It was the second such announcement made this week.

ConocoPhillips executives say they will be selling its entire Nigerian business unit, including onshore and offshore holdings, to the company Oando Energy Resources Inc., an exploration and production company active in Nigeria and the Gulf of Guinea in West Africa.

The sale gives Oando control over ConocoPhillips' former onshore business Phillips Oil Co. Nigeria Ltd., which controls a 20 percent interest in crude oil production leases in Nigeria. Oando also gets a 17 percent stake in a developing liquefied natural gas export project that another ConocoPhillips subsidiary holds.

ConocoPhillips executives said Oando will also acquire the company's offshore oil and gas activities in that country. The smaller company is buying Conoco Exploration and Production Nigeria Ltd., which now controls a 95 percent operating stake in one offshore project. Oando will also acquire a separate business unit that holds a 20 percent interest in a deepwater project being managed by a consortium of companies.

This latest announced sale, which should close by the middle of next year, brings ConocoPhillips closer to its stated goal of raising $11 billion through asset sales in 2012.

"Proceeds from these divestitures will allow the company to continue executing its existing growth programs and capture new opportunities for the future," that company said in a release.

Earlier this week, officials there announced that ConocoPhillips would be exiting operations in Algeria, a North African nation that is believed to hold substantial deposits of shale gas.

The company said Wednesday that the Indonesian energy company Pertamina would purchase ConocoPhillips' Algerian subsidiary for around $1.75 billion. The sale gives Pertamina development rights in three onshore oil fields and existing projects producing around 11,000 barrels of oil equivalent per day in oil and natural gas (EnergyWire, Dec. 19).

For 2013, ConocoPhillips plans to focus on developing more unconventional energy assets, especially in North America.

Earlier this month, the company told its shareholders it was planning a capital spending budget of $15.8 billion for next year, about the same level of investment undertaken in 2012. A significant portion of that money will be spent on shale and tight crude oil plays in the United States, primarily in the Eagle Ford, Bakken, Barnett and Niobrara shales, and in the west Texas Permian Basin.

New drilling in emerging Canadian shale regions is also expected, and the company promises new deepwater drilling in the Gulf of Mexico.