(Special Report) Why Dangote should watch his back ahead of 2019 election
Since the coming of the current administration in Nigeria, investigations have shown that Dangote Group has become the conglomerate with the highest volume of private sector investments.
This spanned from rice mills and farms, sugarcane fields and mill, cement production line expansion, Africa wide cement factories, Dangote Sinotruck expansion, Dangote University scheme Abuja, salt revolution, and most trending is the Dangote Refinery and Petrochemicals, Lekki in Lagos.
Only recently, the President of the group, Alhaji Aliko Dangote, said the revenue of his group of companies will hit $30bn by 2020 according to The Cable news platform.
Kay fact made by the leading African billionaire, while speaking at the Africa Investment Forum in Johannesburg, South Africa, noted that the progress being made by the Dangote Group was as a result of the bold steps taken to venture into spaces others were running away from.
However, in the run up to the forecast for 2020, development economist, (name with held) who spoke to Business Hilights weekend on the comment credited to Dangote, said “With such a revelation coming during an election year, Dangote should be very careful or remain apolitical as he has been all through to avoid being dabbled into or linked to any party or presidential candidate.
“This advice has become important as many intimidating business figures especially in emerging economies are easily dragged into one form of campaign sponsorship or the other which may backfire and force the existing or even an incoming administration to begin to see the investor as a threat.
“Immediately, a government begins to see an investor as a threat, the days of the investor’s companies and fame are numbered as policies that can in no time wish away corporate gains can be made either with or without executive fiat.
The development economist averred that “With a global investor of Dangote’s status, the best bet for him and his companies is to continue to remain apolitical in all ramifications as any step taken that has a political undertone must be forensically analysed by concerned parties”.
Though there had not been any credible information on any form of sponsorship or support for any of the frontline presidential candidates, pundits say the best bet for the safety and security of Dangote’s investments within the shores of Nigeria is for him to continue his current model of maintaining safe distances from politically exposed persons (PEPs) before, during and after the 2019 elections.
Reliving his rise to stardom in the last few years, Dangote noted that “Ten years ago, if you mentioned to me or even if I actually saw it in a dream that our company would have revenue of $30bn, I would have said it was impossible.
“But today, by 2020, we will have $30bn of revenue. Why? Because we have gone into a very bold product and while people are running away from investing, we are investing.”
He added that from just petrochemicals, refinery and oil, the group would have over $25bn, while the rest of the business would have $6bn in that order.
