President, Dangote Industries and Africa’s richest man, Aliko Dangote added $4.3 billion to his fortunes by the end of 2019, as his investments in cement, flour and sugar grew further, Bloomberg Billionaires Index disclosed.
The 62-year-old Nigerian businessman and Africa’s most prominent industrialist ended the decade with a net worth of almost $15 billion, making him join the league of wealthiest men in the world (96th).
Born into a wealthy Muslim family of traders in the north, Dangote incorporated his own business, selling cement at 21. He shifted to manufacturing the building material in the 1990s, helped by government policies that encouraged ways to reduce the need for imports.
His critics still accused him of taking advantage of his closeness to the government to gain an unfair market advantage, a claim he has repeatedly dismissed.
His conglomerate, Dangote Industries, includes the biggest cement company on the continent, the Lagos-listed Dangote Cement Plc. That’s one of four publicly traded companies under the Dangote umbrella that account for more than a fifth of the value of the Nigerian Stock Exchange (NSE).
[READ MORE: Dangote discloses N25 billion loss to Apapa road network)
The year 2020 could be significant for the billionaire who is close to completing one of the world’s largest oil refineries in Nigeria. The plant has the capacity to meet more than Nigeria’s entire fuel consumption and could transform an economy that currently imports all its refined product needs. Dangote is also constructing a fertilizer factory on the same site.
Meanwhile, Nairametrics had reported the intention of the business mogul to invest more in agriculture.
Alhaji Aliko Dangote, who disclosed during the Dangote Industries Special Day at the 40th Kano International Trade Fair, explained that he would also continue to partner with various tiers of governments in the country, in order to build sustainable and inclusive economy for the benefit of all Nigerians.
