Africa's story is just beginning.

Shoulders of Mentors I Consistently Learn From

Listening to Aliko Dangote, one of the many voices I consistently follow, I’ve been reflecting deeply on his recent conversation about Africa Finance Corporation and Africa’s broader economic future. He speaks about Africa’s potential, but more importantly, the urgent question: how do we turn this potential into real value? He emphasizes that there are “big players” on the continent who share his vision and heart, but the challenge has always been execution and systems.

Across the continent, he laments how structural barriers continue to slow progress. For example, the reality that he requires over 38 visas just to move across Africa. How do you invest in a continent you cannot freely move within? Who has the time to constantly apply for visas and go through embassies just to conduct business? He draws comparisons with more integrated regions where movement is seamless, questioning why Africa still operates in fragmented systems where access to European countries seems easier than access within our own borders. Even global platforms like Shein show how fast supply chains and integrated markets can scale when systems are frictionless.

There is a renaissance being pushed by a group of like-minded individuals focused on free movement of people, goods, and services across Africa. These are critical pillars because without them, there is no scalable African economy. He breaks it down practically: if goods cannot move freely, and if border delays take two weeks or more to gain access, then intra-African trade becomes uncompetitive. We simply cannot trade like that.

He also highlights transport and infrastructure inefficiencies. Most people who own the ships that move goods are owned by other nationalities, not Africans. He gives an example of how much it costs him to move goods from Lagos to other ports, like Accra it costs more than moving goods from Lagos to Spain and vice versa. Even aviation costs are extreme he mentions a city in Nigeria to Accra costing around $600 USD, meaning people don't have that kind of freedom to move products around often. For Dangote, a dynasty like that is easy, but he wants to make it easy for other people too.

For Dangote, this is not theory it is a lived reality as a builder. He built a refinery at a scale of more than $20 billion designed to add value to fuel. The interviewer asks him how this big idea came across and how he did it. He explains that Nigeria sits on a lot of oil reserves, yet at a certain point, they were exporting about 2.4 million barrels of crude oil per day and not processing one single barrel. Every single drop of refined oil was imported.

The Dangote Refinery was always on the agenda with discussions, but when people heard about 650,000 barrels, all the big corporations and companies told people the Dangote refinery would never happen. He says thank you to the IFC (International Finance Corporation) that took a risk on the Dangote refinery by giving them a pool of funding. Before getting into the oil sector, he discloses he had never even seen crude oil physically in his life. People take the crude oil business as a dirty business, and he wanted to do a clean business.

He says when he started his business, most African countries were importing oil; other than Algeria and Libya, no country had the efficiency to produce petroleum products. He had to establish a company where he did EPC, which is Engineering, Procurement, and Construction. Every single nut and bolt they bought, they shipped and put everything together themselves. Today, he has tested the refinery up to 661,000 barrels a day. He has been stable for the last 60 months at 650,000 barrels per day, and every single department is working.

He emphasizes that for Africa to develop, some of us must take that risk to open up Africa by opening and investing our money in Africa. If he himself had not invested in his own country, how would he have the confidence to go to other people and ask them to invest in Africa? Now he has a voice and a mouth because he has done it and demonstrated it is possible with the Dangote Group and the refinery. Dangote has deliberately supported African countries, and he feels satisfied as a human being to take his continent out of this cycle. He says as Africans, we can't keep importing everything, including food.

He started looking at what the needs of Africa are, and the critical needs of Africa are petroleum products and fertilizers. You know, today he says his company over the next 2 years will be the largest fertilizer company in the world. He is putting up 12 million tons of urea and opening up mines of potash and phosphate in Congo-Brazzaville. He is going into power, building the biggest port, and building LNG. Why? Because he now has freedom of his assets, they can raise more money, and his cash flow is strong.

What does he want to do with all this money? He asks how African countries can benefit from this. His own mission at Dangote is to look for the critical needs of Africa and say yes, we will make those critical areas a reality. How can we in Africa be importing cocoa when every single cocoa bean is shipped out? Process it. Don't wait for foreign investors; they can only come if they see our own commitment.

So for Dangote, he says he owns a super-majority of his companies' shares, mostly over 90% even with the support. He says and I agree that for any company to grow at scale, you must seek partnerships. The Airbnb users and Marriott have grown at scale because of partnerships where others invest in products, but they manage, set up systems for those investments to return on investment, and get a management fee. Dangote is listing the refinery for shares and asking Africans to buy, asking Africans to invest by purchasing. All his dividends will be in dollars, in rand, kes, and naira, and all the shares will be calculated in dollars. While others buy apartments in the US, Dubai, or Europe if they have money, he chooses to empower his own Africans by listing his Dangote business. When people have quality assets on the continent, they perform; companies in West Africa like Sonatel, whenever they are issuing on the stock exchange, people are oversubscribing because quality assets guarantee returns.

The interview was conducted by the IFC President, Makhtar Diop, who has supported and provided funding for Dangote companies and initiatives. Africa, we can't work in silos. We need to scale. Africa is trapped by foreign traps, and Dangote is building something powerful enough to challenge the system through this Dangote listing.

Dangote says today if he has a projection where his company will have $100 billion of revenue, his EBITDA Earnings Before Interest, Taxes, Depreciation, and Amortization (which measures a company's core operating profitability) will have $30 to $35 billion. Let's look at the way they give dividends at the company level; sometimes they have given dividends at 90%. But the parent company, which is Dangote Companies, has never given dividends to him personally. He says he has never taken one single dime in dividends since he started; everything has been reinvested into the company.

He says a worst-case scenario, if he gives dividends of $20 billion and sells 25% of that 25 billion, he will inject billions of dollars directly into African hands. Do you know what that can do to the lives of Africans? Dangote says he is now working with the Central Bank of Nigeria, the Nigerian Stock Exchange, and Security and Exchange solutions to figure out how these things will happen to take the Dangote money and sell. Dangote says if he does this listing and raises even $25 billion in dividends for Africans, that is a lot of money, even for his own legacy. The IFC president wanted to also jump on board with the Nigerian Security Exchange and the Central Bank of Nigeria as they figure out how to make this happen.

Dangote says this will be a self-satisfying goal for him. If this happens, it will be big. It will mark a new era and chapter for Africa where we are not waiting for handouts but beginning to build our own industries, shaping our own story, systems, financial power, and ports.

The real question is no longer just "if" Africa rises, but if Africa does not act now as Dangote pushes deeper into power, construction, fertilizer, oil, and trade, the resistance against him can only grow stronger. Is dangote building a stronger African future, or a world global interview from an Africa geopolitical insider?

Africa's story is just beginning.

“True African progress will not come from permission it will come from ownership, movement, and the courage to build systems that outlive us.” – MN Collective

******

MNCOLLECTIVE INSIGHTS UNFILTERED

BELIEVE. BRAND. BUILD