Alhaji Aliko Dangote (GCON)
Aliko Dangote was born in the northern Nigerian state of Kano on April 10, 1957 into a wealthy Hausa-Muslim family. His mother Mariya Sanusi Dantata was the granddaughter of legendary businessman Alhassan Dantata, and his father Mohammed Dangote was Dantata’s business associate.

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Dangote had an early interest in business “I can remember when I was in primary school, I would go and buy cartons of sweets and I would start selling them just to make money. I was so interested in business, even at that time.” He attended the Al Azhar University in Cairo, Egypt (the oldest university in the world) studying business studies, before working for his uncle Abdulkadir Sanusi Dantata who eventually gave him a business loan of $3000 at the age of 21.

Dangote Group
Dangote started trading commodities and building materials in Kano in 1977. He moved to Lagos that summer and, encouraged by the success of his business ventures so far, incorporated two companies in 1981

The Dangote Group, originally a small trading firm founded in 1977, is now a multi-trillion-naira conglomerate with operations in Benin, Ghana, Nigeria, Cameroon, Zambia, South Africa and Togo.

Aliko Dangote has a knack for seeing opportunity that others can’t see. He approached the Nigerian Ports Authority with the idea of leasing an abandoned piece of land at the Apapa Port, where he subsequently built facilities for his flour company. When other flour companies protested, the chairman of the NPA, Chief Olabode George stated that Dangote was the one who came up with the idea. Similarly, in the 1990s he approached the Central Bank of Nigeria with the idea that it would be cheaper for the bank to allow his transport company to manage their fleet of staff buses.

Dangote Cement
Dangote Cement is Sub-Saharan Africa’s largest cement manufacturer, with a production capacity of 52 million tonnes per year from its production facilities across 10 African countries.

Dangote Cement’s production facilities include the

1) Benue Cement Company (BCC) in Gboko, Benue State.

2) Obajana Cement Factory in Kogi State. It is the biggest cement factory in Sub-Saharan Africa, with a production capacity of 16.25 million tonnes per year across 5 lines.

3) Dangote Cement Plant, Ibese, Ogun State.

4) Dangote Cement Plant, Okpella, Edo State

Dangote Cement also has plants in Zambia, Tanzania, Ethiopia, Senegal, Congo (Brazzaville), Ghana, Ivory Coast and Cameroon.

It has majority shares (64%) in Sephaku Cement in South Africa (the remaining shares are owned by Sephaku Holdings).

Dangote Cement is the largest company that is listed on the Nigerian Stock Exchange. It is valued at approximately ₦8.1 trillion, representing about 12.2% of the entire Nigerian Exchange equity market.

Dangote Sugar Refinery PLC

The Dangote Group dominates the sugar market in Nigeria: it is the major sugar supplier (70% of the market) to the country’s soft drink companies, breweries, and confectioners.

The Dangote Sugar Refinery in Apapa, Lagos is the largest in Africa and one of the largest in the world.

Dangote Oil Refinery and Petrochemical Company

The two companies that Aliko Dangote created in 1981 were Dangote Nigeria Limited, and Blue Star Services.

In 2007 (during the Obasanjo era), Bluestar Oil Services, a consortium comprising Blue Star Services (Dangote), Zennon Oil (Femi Otedola), Sinopec (China) and Transcorp (Obasanjo/Elumelu) bought the Kaduna and Port Harcourt refineries.

However, oil workers went on strike and the Yar’Adua Administration reversed the sale.

In 2012 Aliko Dangote announced that he would build an oil refinery and it would be located at the Olokola Free Trade Zone in Ogun State.

Issues with the host community and state government led to the relocation of the plant to the Lekki Free Trade Zone.

The Dangote Oil Refinery was commissioned on May 22nd, 2023. It is the largest single train refinery in the world (7th largest refinery overall). When fully operational, it is expected to have the capacity to process about 650,000 barrels of crude oil per day.

In 2019, the world’s largest crude distillation column, weighing 2,350 tonnes, was installed in place at the Dangote refinery by a specialist Dutch company. With a height of 112 metres it is slightly taller than the Saturn V rocket which brought the first man to the moon (110.6m) and 16 metres taller than Big Ben. In the same year, three more records were set when the world’s heaviest refinery regenerator was installed – having already been the “heaviest item ever to be transported over a public road in Africa” at a stately 3,000 tonnes and also being “the heaviest single piece of steel structure” of the world.