Dangote
in an interview with CNBC last month, suggested the sale of some National
assets to revive the ailing economy.
Africa's
richest man, Aliko Dangote, says although he suggested the sale of some
National assets as measures to get out of the current economic recession, he is
not interested in buying any.
His suggestion however received some level of backlash from many Nigerians as they felt he was planning to "buy up Nigeria". In an interview with This Day, Dangote said even if NLNG or any other national asset is offered to him on credit, he will not buy.
His suggestion however received some level of backlash from many Nigerians as they felt he was planning to "buy up Nigeria". In an interview with This Day, Dangote said even if NLNG or any other national asset is offered to him on credit, he will not buy.
"Why did I suggest that we
should sell some of the assets? I know the touchy one is the NLNG. I want to
make it categorically clear that even if the government is selling NLNG on
credit, I am not interested in buying. I don’t have any interest in NLNG and I
will not buy it.
It is not a business that I want to invest in. It is a mature
business; that is what people don’t understand. You see, we should have
invested heavily in all these Brass LNG, Olokola LNG, etc, when former
President Olusegun Obasanjo started work on the projects, but we missed the
opportunity.
Today, you have massive LNG projects that have been done by Qatar,
Australia and the United States is also exporting. But right now, all the gas
that we have is even in the ground. Even Mozambique has a massive amount of gas
and also Tanzania, and they are nearer to the markets than we are. So, if
somebody is even going to invest in LNG, he would go to those areas and invest
there and not here in Nigeria, because the investment here daunting. So my own
suggestion is that even if we must sell, it doesn’t have to be 100 per cent of
our interest in NLNG.”
"People are just saying it is better to go and
borrow, but I don’t know where they are coming from. You see, with borrowing,
if I have issues with my business today, the bankers who would lend me the
money would want to see me doing something first to see how the business can
survive. There would be conditionalities. But if you are not shedding weight,
how do you expect somebody to help you with funding?
You have to start first by
trying to shed weight and showing the person (lender) who wants to help you
with the assets you want to sell”.
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