By MICHELLE FAUL
Associated Press
Updated: October 8, 2013 2:10PM
LAGOS, Nigeria (AP) — A pan-African
magazine says Africa has many more billionaires than previously
reported, 55 of them worth $143.88 billion including a Nigerian said to
be the richest black woman in the world.
“Move over, Oprah!” Ventures Africa says in its latest edition published this week.
Editor-in-chief Uzodinma Iweala said Tuesday the magazine’s estimates are “on the conservative side.”
The report predictably identifies Nigerian
manufacturer Aliko Dangote as the richest African worth $20.2 billion,
among 20 Nigerians listed.
Africa Ventures put the average net worth of
Africa’s billionaires at $2.6 billion and their average age at 65. The
oldest billionaires are Kenyan industrialist Manu Chandaria and Egyptian
property tycoon Mohammed Al-Fayed, both aged 84. The youngest
billionaires are Mohammed Dewji of Tanzania and Nigerian oil trader Igho
Sanomi, both 38 years old.
Nigeria, South Africa and Egypt had the highest
numbers of the richest Africans, with nine in South Africa and eight in
Egypt. It said Algeria, Angola, Zimbabwe and Swaziland only have one
billionaire each. It identified billionaires in only 10 of Africa’s 53
countries.
The magazine’s survey surprises by identifying oil
tycoon Folorunsho Alakija as the richest black woman in the world,
saying that she is worth $7.3 billion.
Forbes magazine in its respected list had estimated Alakija’s fortune at $600 million and Oprah Winfrey’s worth at $2.9 billion.
The Forbes list of Africa’s 40 Richest has only 16 billionaires including two Nigerians.
“I think being more rigorous and being closer to
the ground makes it easier to figure out on a continent where
information is not as readily available and things are not as
transparent,” Iweala explained in a telephone interview.
He said the Lagos-based magazine, which boasts it
“champions African capitalism by celebrating African success, free
enterprise and the entrepreneurial spirit,” regularly collects
information about rich Africans and dedicated three months to research
spread across the continent.
Iweala said he was excited to find several Africans
who have become wealthy through manufacturing and financial services
showing “we’re moving away from a continent that is just
resource-based.”
He found Africa’s billionaires “very bullish on
Africa: They believe this is the environment to make fortunes and to
make changes ... they are not taking their money and running” abroad.
And he found Africa’s richest people are becoming
more transparent about their wealth and more formal in returning wealth
to the community: “As people have more and more money we’re seeing more
and more foundations putting money back, and in a more structured way.”
Alakija’s Rose of Sharon Foundation helps support widows and orphans all over Nigeria, for instance.
According to Ventures Africa, the 61-year-old
Alakija studied fashion design in London in the 1980s and returned home
to set up Supreme Stitches, which became an exclusive label catering to a
wealthy clientele including Mariam Babangida, wife of former Nigerian
military dictator Ibrahim Babangida. In 1993, the Babangida regime gave
Alakija a license to explore for oil in a block that has become one of
the most prolific in the oil-rich country, producing some 200,000
barrels a day, according to the magazine.
It credited Alakija for holding on to her license
and entering into a joint venture with an international oil exploration
company at a time when many Nigerians given licenses, mainly military
generals, sold them off to international oil firms.
Alakija fought a court case for more than a decade
when a civilian government forcefully awarded itself a 50 percent
interest in her company, after the field was confirmed in 2000 to hold
reserves in excess of 1 billion barrels. A court last year voided the
government’s acquisition and returned the stake to Alakija’s Famfa Oil,
which she runs as a family business with her husband and four sons.
Ventures Africa said the value of Alakija’s 60
percent stake in the block, based on recent sales in Nigeria, is between
$6.44 billion and $8.3 billion.
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Online: www.ventures-africa.com
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