Cheikh helps Senegal celebrate the sweet success of Sangomar
Last week marked the first anniversary of production from the Sangomar Project.

Last week marked the first anniversary of production from the Sangomar Project – and what a year it’s been: Senegal’s first offshore oil and gas project has delivered significant success for both Woodside and the West African nation. Sangomar has underscored the quality of our company’s assets and the abilities of our people to deliver large-scale projects of value to shareholders.
Woodsiders’ skills were amply demonstrated as they completed the work on the Project, cleared the enormous hurdles erected by COVID-19 and then overcame the massive logistical disruptions the pandemic inflicted. Despite these unprecedented challenges and disruption, safety remained front and centre and some 30 million hours of work was completed without a single serious injury. Within only nine weeks of first oil in mid-June, Sangomar had achieved nameplate capacity. It continues to this day to deliver exceptional production reliability and safety performance.
Cheikh Gueye is one Woodsider who has enjoyed a ground-level view of Sangomar’s success from the country’s capital, Dakar. Cheikh, Woodside’s Country Manager Senegal, says: “People are very excited and proud with Sangomar’s success, and the Woodside brand is now associated with good news and positivity.
"Sangomar has shown that Senegal can do as good as other nations."
Cheikh was born and raised in Dakar. His mother was a fabrics buyer, travelling the world to source products for local businesses while his father, originally from Gabon, was a jeweller. One of nine children, Cheikh was educated in Dakar schools till he graduated from high school and moved to France for university studies. He studied law in Reims in France’s Champagne region, and then completed a master’s in business in Rouen, Normandy.
His early career included working in Senegal and France: firstly in a bank and then as in-house counsel at ArcelorMittal (the world’s largest steel company by revenue) where he was responsible for the group’s mining interests in France. He also worked in HR for a minerals sands company before joining Woodside in 2016 as a country representative for Senegal to support setting up of our office in Dakar and establishing relations with the national Government.
Learning about Woodside’s business entailed two years with wife Aida and children in Perth, where he supported VP Pluto Mike Price as a business adviser. “It was a good chance to learn about the business and the LNG business and better understand joint ventures dynamics and relationships management,” Cheikh recalls. “It was a great opportunity for me and my family – they all enjoyed their time in Perth.”
Perth was also the place where Cheikh discovered a liking for DIY and carpentry – a pastime he continues to enjoy after returning home to Dakar.
He became Country Manager Senegal in June 2024. “My principal role is to ensure Woodside’s position is heard and understood and also to gather feedback from the company’s stakeholders in Senegal and share it as part of our decision-making processes,” he explains. “But there are lots of other aspects to my job including engaging with local communities, investigating where our social investment can best be sustainably directed and managing the Dakar office.”
He attends important energy conferences like SIEPA, held last month in Dakar and he also works closely with Marketing and manages the Production Sharing Contract with PETROSEN, our partner in the Sangomar JV.
As for Woodside’s direction in Senegal, Cheikh says that’s also being explored, adding Sangomar’s Phase 1 has laid a solid foundation for further activity. “I’m told by other senior Woodsiders that the success of what’s been achieved with Sangomar has been great for the company – it’s had a very positive impact across Africa,” he says.
“The idea is to build on the good relationship with the Senegal national government and the success of our current operations and see what else we might be able to do here.”