Aliko Dangote, founder and president of the Dangote Group,
says foreign interests are working against Africa’s growth.
The billionaire spoke on Thursday at the Investing in Africa
forum, held on the sidelines of the ongoing IMF-World Bank spring meetings in
Washington, DC.
Calling for stronger regional integration, the
philanthropist dismissed the idea of successful implementation of a single
African market without a functioning regional market.
“The Africa free trade will work, but it can only work when
the regional markets work,” the industrialist said.
“The regional markets must work first before you leave
because the dotted points [of] all these regional markets are not working.
“You cannot have one single market. And you know, you have
to also remember that there are a lot of international interest, I’m sorry to
say, this international interest in not wanting to see Africa grow.”
Dangote said Africa has not had any refinery in “donkey
years”, noting that “there are so many interests not allowing” refinery
projects in other countries to happen.
On attracting foreign capital to the continent, the
entrepreneur stressed that foreign investment is often driven by risk
perception.
He said Africans must first invest in their continent before
foreign investors can come in.
“Foreigners will invest. But foreigners are also smart
people. Anything you talk about risk, they want to look at it 10 times. So how
can we derisk? The only way to derisk is we Africans must lead and show that
that risk is a perceived risk [and] not a real risk,” Dangote said.
“If I’m not investing in Africa, there is no way I will go
and convince anybody outside the continent to come and invest. So, I must now
show that this risk is perceived.”
The billionaire said there is no country free of risks, “but you must know how to mitigate this risk”.
Dangote called on rich Africans to invest their wealth in
the region and keep it in offshore bank accounts.
“I sometimes say that in terms of cash, there might be some
people who have more cash than me, but don’t keep that money in a foreign bank,
bring it back home, invest, the place is good, you’ll make a lot of money,” he
said.
“But we have this problem of always looking for foreign
investors. Foreign investors will never come because the foreign investor is
smarter than us, so they won’t come.”
He said they can only come when they see that Africans are
committed, serious, and “we are investing our own money”.
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