DANGOTE READIES $10 BILLION NIGERIAN OIL REFINERY FOR 2020

Aliko Dangote.

Africa’s richest man, Aliko Dangote, plans to start selling gasoline, diesel and aviation fuel by early 2020 from an oil refinery he’s building near Lagos, Nigeria’s commercial capital.

The $10 billion refinery, set to be one of the world’s largest and process 650,000 barrels of crude a day, should be near full capacity by mid-2020, Edwin Devakumar, group executive director at Dangote Industries Ltd., said in an interview at the coastal site, about an hour’s drive east of Lagos.

“People still have difficulty believing we can do it on time and within those costs,” Devakumar, 61, said Wednesday. “But we believe we can. It’s something of the size that’s rarely been done before. It’s huge.”

Dangote, worth $12.4 billion according to the Bloomberg Billionaire’s Index, has said the refinery can transform Nigeria by weaning it off fuel imports and generating foreign exchange through exports. Despite being Africa’s biggest crude producer and an OPEC member, the West African nation ships in almost all its gasoline and diesel from abroad because of the decrepit state of its government-owned refineries.

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