Dangote, others still suffering border closure as ECOWAS reject shipped goods
Even as diplomatic drives powered by Ministers of Foreign Affairs from Nigeria, Benin and Niger inch closer to resolving key issues leading to the border closure, leading Nigerian manufacturing concerns have continued to count their loses in the current border closure by the Federal Government.
Otherwise, the impact of the prolonged land border closure by the Nigerian government is now negatively affecting the country’s exports, especially to neighbouring West African countries. For much of last week, Business Hilights gathered that Nigerian exporters unceasingly counted their losses given their inability to export products through the land border.
For example, Dangote Cement, largest cement producer in Nigeria – said during an engagement between the management and Codros Capital, that it completely halted exportation of cementitious products in August 2019 owing to the land border closure.
Furthermore, it was reported that goods exported through the sea ports were boycotted by off-takers across the ECOWAS bloc in retaliation against the FGN’s hard stance on the border. Considering the fact that Nigeria’s exports to ECOWAS constituted 4.4% of the total exports as of Q2-19, we estimated that the country could potentially lose c.NGN800 billion per annum in export value should the border closure persist.
