A few years back, Aliko Dangote, Africa's richest man and an ardent Arsenal FC fan, reluctantly abandoned his dream of buying the London club – saying he had no “excess liquidity” because he was channelling everything he had into his biggest project yet: the continent's largest oil refinery.
That act of self-discipline is now richly rewarding Dangote, says The Economist. Since the start of the war with Iran, his phone hasn't stopped ringing with offers for his gasoline, diesel and aviation fuel.
“People are ready to pay anything now,” he says. Aliko Dangote's $20 billion refinery complex, which spans “an area nearly half the size of Manhattan” outside Lagos in Nigeria, can process 650,000 barrels a day. It is by far the largest scheme owned by the Dangote Group, the cement-to-sugar conglomerate behind his estimated $28.5 billion fortune. But Dangote, 68, suggests it symbolises something more: seeing the plant as a clarion call for the continent to become more self-reliant. “If we Africans don't lead in the industrialisation of Africa, Africa will never industrialise.”
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“No one should confuse the tycoon with an altruist” – Dangote's many critics argue he milks state-backed monopolies in several essential sectors, now including oil. Still, the refinery is “a macroeconomic feat as well as an industrial one”. Last year the International Monetary Fund estimated that, if run at full capacity, it would boost Nigeria's non-oil GDP by 1.5% between 2025 and 2026, and boost official dollar reserves by $5.5 billion annually. Double that, says Business Day Nigeria: Dangote has just announced plans to expand capacity to 1.4 million barrels per day and is also scaling up the group's fertiliser and polypropylene plants. The refinery has blown apart a bad trade for Nigeria, says Business Insider. For decades, it was forced to export its crude – and then spend billions importing refined fuel.
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How Aliko Dangote built his billions
Trading runs in the family. Aliko Dangote's great-grandfather, as he told Time in 2014, was “a kola nut trader, and the richest man in West Africa at the time of his death”. His own father was a businessman and politician, though he was raised by his grandfather. “It's traditional in my culture for the grandparents to take the first grandchild and raise it. I had a lot of love, and it gave me a lot of confidence.” After studying business at Al-Azhar University in Cairo, he started trading himself in the 1970s – eventually gaining “exclusive import rights” for cement, sugar and salt, says The Economist. Generations of influence helped. At the turn of the century he started making cement, and Dangote Cement “became the concrete foundation of his fortune”. The move into oil refining promises to be just as transformative.
Aliko Dangote is still the only African among the world's 100 richest people, according to Forbes. He has appointed his three daughters – Fatima, Mariya and Halima – to head key operations across his group, while honing his contacts at events such as Davos – Cherie Blair is an independent director of the group's board. Mild-mannered and courteous in person, Aliko Dangote has a tendency to lecture other wealthy Nigerians on their responsibilities, says Business Insider, especially those seduced by luxury consumption.
“If you have money for a Rolls-Royce, you should go and put up an industry in your locality… or wherever you feel there is a need.” No wonder he puts backs up.
But Aliko Dangote has done Nigerians a real service, says Feyi Fawehinmi in the FT. Since coming online in 2024, his refinery has saved the country “dollars and dignity”. Fuel shortages have long been an “obsession” in Nigeria. But “when supply is reliable “both the economy and the national mood shift”. Dangote's great contribution has been “the quiet revolution of availability”.
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