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AP Photo/ Alexander Zemlianichenko
Would you call a company "Nigaz"? Probably not actually, no, given the way that the word is likely to be pronounced, you'd shy away from using that as your company name.
More especially, you probably wouldn't use the name "Nigaz" if your company were to be based in Nigeria (where there is, indeed, a large Hip Hop musical scene and a keen awareness of US slang).
But that is indeed just what Gazprom, the Russian oil and gas giant, has done.
To explain why, allow me to delve a little into my years of working in Russia. Company names tend not to be too imaginative, they don't call things "Apple" (nor "Leaf", "Twig" or "Apricot") nor do they tend to use names like "Chrysler" or "Ford".
Rather, if you're the "Third Steel Fabrication Plant in Oblinsk" (to entirely make up a company name and even possibly a city) then your company will be called "Third Steel Fabrication Plant in Oblinsk" or perhaps some contraction of that name.
As an example, one company that I did some work with was called "Atomenergoexport" and you wouldn't need to be a genius to decode that as the company that dealt with atomic energy equipment for export: as indeed they are, they've been working on and off with the Iranian nuclear power system for 15 years or so.
So now you have the background, why "Nigaz"? For the geopolitical and business background to the deal I recommend this piece by my Examiner colleague Issac Ugbabe. I'm just interested in the name myself.
If you have a deal between Gazprom and, say, a Nigerian producer of natural gas, what are you going to use as your company name? Following the above Russian conventions you could call it "Gazprom in Nigeria". Or if, as is more common now, we're going to be talking about contractions, we could have "Gaznig", or "Gazeria". Or even "Promeria", or "Promnig". Just to complete the set, "Niprom", "Eriaprom" (sounds like a bad high school slasher movie really) or "Eriagaz".
But no, out of their possibilities (and do tell me if I missed some) they decided to call it "Nigaz". No, really, the BBC tells us so:
Russia's energy giant Gazprom has signed a $2.5bn (£1.53bn) deal with Nigeria's state operated NNPC, to invest in a new joint venture.
The new firm, to be called Nigaz, is set to build refineries, pipelines and gas power stations in Nigeria.
You have to think that brand consultants are in rather short supply in the Russian oil and gas business really.
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