Adesina, Otedola, Ezekwesili, Falana Wade In On Dangote/NNPCL Saga

…Nigerian Govt Will Be The Looser – AfDB President

….Controversies Projecting Nigeria Negatively To Investors – Falana

…..Tinubu Should Launch Independent Audit Of Dangote Refinery – NNPC Transactions – Ezekwesili

 

More prominent Nigerians have waded in on the issues between Dangote Refinery, NNPCL and NMDPRA.

Osun Defender reports that Nigerian regulatory authorities had accused Dangote Refinery of rolling out sub-standard petroleum products, a claim the company has refuted.

The Chairman of the Dangote Group Aliko Dangote had also shelved plans for investment in the steel sector owing to accusations of monopoly against him.

The issue has generated many controversies with the House of Representatives launching an investigation to determine the veracity of
some of the allegations.

Nigerian Govt Will Be The Looser – AfDB President

The President of the African Development Bank Group (AfDB), Akinwumi Adesina, while contributing on the issue, said the Nigerian government will be the loser.

Adesina noted that such criticism would discourage foreign investors from coming to the country.

Adesina, who dismissed claims of Dangote’s monopoly of the country’s manufacturing sector, expressed shock at the controversy, saying it was creating bad waves for Nigeria globally.

He made this known in a statement shared on X by business mogul Femi Otedola on Tuesday.

The statement read in part, “Monopoly often exists where there are high barriers to entry or high capital costs. How many individuals or companies can do railways? How many can do refineries of the scale of Dangote Refineries? In a nation that has been importing refined petroleum products for several decades, the abnormal simply became very normal.

“No smart investor would make a $19.5 billion investment and want it to be undermined by importers. To manufacture is extremely expensive and risky. This is even more so in Nigeria, given the very challenging business and economic environment, fraught with policy uncertainties and policy reversals, and where the self-defeating default mode of ‘simply import it’ is always so easily rationalised and chorused to solve any problem.

“…This whole disparaging of Dangote is uncalled for. It is self-defeating. And it is very bad for Nigeria. Who will want to come and invest in a country that disparages and undermines its own largest investor? Investing is tough. Pettiness is easy. It sadly sends a signal that the price for sacrificing for Nigeria is to get sacrificed.”

Aliko Dangote Is A Titan Thaf Must Be Supported- Femi Otedola

Also throwing weight behind Dangote, the chairman of FBN Holdings, Femi Otedola, recounted the contributions and vast impact Dangote has made in the country and beyond.

In a Tuesday post on X, Otedola wrote, “My brother, the Visionary, has built the largest single train refinery in the world, not in Kano, but in Lagos State. He is the owner of the second-largest sugar refinery in the world, also in Lagos State, and the largest cement factory in the world, not in Kano, but in Kogi State. Additionally, he has established one of the second-largest fertilizer plants in the world, soon to surpass the biggest one in Qatar, also in Lagos State. Furthermore, he has built a fertilizer plant in Lagos that already exports globally. Aliko Dangote is a titan that God created specially for mankind.

“Aliko Dangote is also the largest private sector employer of labor in the country, and his companies are among the largest taxpayers. In fact, the Dangote Group often pays more in taxes than the top banks combined. If not for him, we would still be importing cement. His contributions extend beyond industrial facilities to critical infrastructure, having built major roads such as the Apapa Oshodi-Owonrosoki Express Road, Wharf Road, and the Obajana-Kabba Road.

“Countries in the nascent stages of industrialization require visionary leaders. This is why it’s no surprise that the United States was built by the vision and tenacity of a few remarkable individuals—Cornelius Vanderbilt, John D. Rockefeller, Andrew Carnegie, J.P. Morgan, and Henry Ford—THE MEN WHO BUILT America’s industrial landscape. These men left the world without these assets but left behind a legacy that has kept their country thriving generation after generation. Their contributions were immortalized not in the material wealth they amassed but in the enduring institutions and industries they established. These visionaries were also supported by their government, which recognized the importance of fostering local champions.

“Similarly, today’s tech giants like Microsoft and Tesla received substantial support from the US government. For example, in January 2010, the Department of Energy issued a $465 million loan to Tesla Motors to produce specially designed, all-electric plug-in vehicles and to develop a manufacturing facility in Fremont, California to produce battery packs, electric motors, and other powertrain components for powering these innovative vehicles. This initiative is part of broader efforts, such as the federal EV-charging program supported by the infrastructure law known as the National Electric Vehicle Infrastructure program, or NEVI.

“In India, the government has been instrumental in supporting business titans like Gautam Adani and Mukesh Ambani. Their companies have received significant backing to grow and expand, contributing substantially to India’s economic growth and global business footprint.

“There are also records of emerging market countries like Vietnam, South Africa, Brazil, and China where their governments have supported local businesses to jump-start industrialization. In Vietnam, the government has provided various incentives to tech companies, fostering a rapidly growing technology sector. In South Africa, government support for the mining industry has been crucial in maintaining its global competitiveness. Brazil has seen substantial government investment in its agricultural sector, transforming it into one of the world’s leading food exporters. In China, government backing for companies like Huawei and Alibaba has propelled them to global leadership in technology and e-commerce.

“In Nigeria, we have our own titans, and it is imperative that we recognize and support them. Aliko Dangote has broken every boundary in worldwide business and industry. His contributions are not just a testament to his brilliance but a beacon of what is possible when vision meets opportunity. Supporting local champions like Dangote is crucial for our national development and economic independence. Let us continue to foster and support these visionaries who drive our nation’s progress..”.

Ezekwesili Calls For Independent Audit

 

Meanwhile, a former Minister of Education, Oby Ezekwesili, has called for an independent audit of why the Nigerian National Petroleum Company Limited capped its investment in the Dangote Petroleum Refinery at 7.2 per cent instead of the planned 20 per cent.

Ezekwesili while reacting to the controversy through her X handle, said she had earlier decided not to speak on the saga.

She stated that “However, as more and more information filtered out from both parties, we can reasonably conclude that something seriously murky has gone on and needs to be fully unravelled for public accountability. And urgently, too.”

The former minister added, “How can a project that by all definition attained the stature of a ‘national interest project’ be marred in this depth of embarrassing controversy that is playing out in the full glare of the local and international investing community?

“Did the Nigerian government not tell us it borrowed $3.3bn from Afriexim-Bank to take a stake in the Dangote refinery?”

The former minister said she used ti tell the NNPC that it could not continue to run as a federation on its own during former President Olusegun Obasanjo’s administration.

“When we were in government, I often told the NNPC leadership that they cannot carry on as though there is a ‘Federal Republic of the NNPC’ just because they think of themselves as ‘the goose that lays the golden egg’.

“The opacity of the NNPC was the reason we took great delight in designing the multi-stakeholders Nigeria Extractive Industries Transparency International in those early 2000s that I pioneered as Chairperson.

“We went above global minimum voluntary standards of transparency requirements by entrenching ours in an Act that established NEITI as the transparency regulator of the oil and minerals sector,” she explained.

She called on President Bola Tinubu “to immediately use the instrumentality of NEITI to launch an independent audit of the Dangote refinery-NNPC transaction to offer the public the true state of play.”

Controversies Projecting Nigeria Negatively To Investors – Falana

Speaking on Channels Television, a legal luminary, Femi Falana, SAN, said he is worried about the negative impacts of the Dangote Refinery spat, saying the saga sends a dangerous signal to investors about Nigeria.

“Well, I’ve enjoyed the inter-class feud or what you might call a dog-eat-dog affair. But it’s at the expense of the country and we cannot continue like this,” Falana said on Tuesday’s edition of Channels Television’s Politics Today.

“The government cannot go around the world asking for foreign investment only to be accused of destroying local investment. It is very dangerous for the country.”

On the monopoly claim, Falana labelled it as childish, saying, “It is so embarrassing that we are telling the whole world that the government of Nigeria is incapable of managing its affairs. That one person is monopolising trade in our country,” he said.

“What is the purpose of the government? It is to checkmate any monopolistic control of any business in Nigeria. But what do you call a monopoly?

“If you have allowed your own refineries to be destroyed, what happens? Somebody now decides to have a refinery, that’s a monopoly. There is nothing you can do about it.”

“You must now stop this childish, very puerile argument that someone wants a monopoly,” he said, calling on the government to work and fix the country’s refineries.

“It is not the business of the government? That’s why you have the Federal Consumer Protection Commission to deal with anybody who wants to maintain a monopoly in business in the country. The government must go back to the drawing table.”

Falana asked the government to work with Dangote Refinery and support its operations.

“If a factory is likely to employ 500,000 people, young people, the government must try and embrace that company and see what can be done,” he said.