Nigeria’s highest paying listed companies collectively paid N42.6 billion in total directors’ emoluments in 2025, as executive compensation across the country’s corporate sector continued to climb.
Of that sum, the highest paid director across each of the ten companies together accounted for N13.78 billion, nearly a third of the total.
The data, compiled by the Nairametrics Research Team from the latest audited financial statements, covers ten companies from sectors such as energy, telecoms, consumer goods, industrial goods, and financial services.
Seplat Energy and MTN Nigeria received the largest shares, with Seplat’s highest-paid director earning N4.79 billion alone.
Both BUA Cement and Guinness Nigeria did not disclose the compensation of their chairman for 2025 and are noted accordingly. The ten companies discussed in this article were selected based on the highest-paid directors.
What the data is saying
Executive pay at Nigeria’s top listed companies reflects a widening gap between the highest and lowest earning boards, with the top five companies accounting for the bulk of the N42.6 billion in total board emoluments paid in 2025.
- Seplat Energy recorded the highest director pay across all metrics. Its top director earned N4.79 billion, up 22.76% from N3.91 billion the previous year, while its chairman received N1.39 billion, a 29.75% drop. The total emoluments for Seplat’s 14 directors during the year amounted to N16.00 billion.
- MTN Nigeria’s highest-paid director earned N2.91 billion, a 7.52% decline, making it the only company among the top five to experience a decrease in director pay. MTN’s chairman received N94 million, with total emoluments for its board being N6.08 billion.
- Dangote Cement’s top director earned N1.66 billion, a 4.80% increase, while its chairman saw the steepest rise in chairman pay, increasing 135.09% to N268 million. Total emoluments for Dangote Cement across 14 directors were N4.58 billion.
- Nigerian Breweries paid N1.29 billion to its highest-paid director, a 12.50% increase from N1.14 billion in 2024, with its chairman receiving N33.79 million, up 39.28% from N24.26 million, disbursing N2.62 billion in total across 13 members of the board during the year.
- Nestlé Nigeria’s top director earned N874.22 million, up 5.20% from N830.99 million, with chairman pay jumping 81.51% to N39.75 million and total emoluments of N1.60 billion across 11 directors.
The remaining five companies saw considerably lower director pay, though they experienced both the sharpest year-on-year increases and declines in top director compensation.
- Lafarge Africa’s highest-paid director earned N710.61 million, a 38.03% rise, with total emoluments for 17 directors amounting to N814.83 million.
- GTCO’s top director earned N494.69 million, a 5.02% increase, with an active board of just seven directors during the year and total emoluments of N691.16 million.
- BUA Cement paid N371.47 million to its top director, a 32.07% rise, with total emoluments of N979.54 million across 9 directors.
- Zenith Bank’s highest-paid director received N367 million, more than doubling from N174 million, a 110.92% jump, the steepest increase in the group. Total emoluments across 15 directors amounted to N8.54 billion.
- Guinness Nigeria recorded the lowest pay, with its top director earning N324 million, a 57.14% drop from N756 million, the steepest decline in the analysis. Total emoluments across the largest board of 17 directors stood at N691.41 million.
More insights
Beyond boardroom pay, wage and workforce data tell a broader story about how these companies are managing their cost of employees, with sector, scale, and headcount strategy producing sharply different outcomes across the group.
- Among the top five, Dangote Cement disbursed the heaviest wage bill at N259.52 billion, up 11.48%, across 20,614 employees, the largest workforce in this analysis.
- Seplat Energy grew wages 35.03% to N96.81 billion across just 1,506 employees. MTN paid N88.84 billion across 2,001 employees, while Nigerian Breweries and Nestlé Nigeria paid N66.41 billion and N31.86 billion, respectively.
- The bottom five present a more uneven picture. Guinness Nigeria recorded the highest wage growth in the entire group at 52.49%, yet its workforce shrank to 752, the smallest in the analysis. BUA Cement paid N20.57 billion, up 19.07%.
- Lafarge Africa’s N4.54 billion wage figure likely reflects subsidiary consolidation rather than true individual pay. GTCO and Zenith Bank, both in the bottom five by emoluments, were top wage spenders at N110.39 billion and N181.07 billion respectively, with Zenith adding 1,126 employees to close the year at 10,397.
What you should know
- Insurance companies, such as Mutual Benefits Assurance and Universal Insurance, were the most frequent offenders, with significant multi-year delays.
- Oando Plc also faced heavy fines, including penalties for its 2023 audited financial statements.
- While penalties for audited financial statements tend to be higher, the more frequent breaches relate to unaudited filings, reflecting ongoing challenges in regulatory compliance across various sectors.
