Success is not measured by money,
power, or social rank. Success is measured by your discipline and inner
peace. -Mike Ditka
Before I am crucified or applauded by
those who may think this piece is to highlight the potentials of the
business mogul for electoral office, I am only referring to a man who is
neither the Managing Director nor the Chairman of his group but is
simply, by official designation, the President of Dangote Group of
companies.
In an environment where wealth is easily
accumulated through questionable and fraudulent means, Alhaji Aliko
Dangote’s business that started from mere trading in commodities and
building materials in the 1970s with a loan from an uncle, has presently
grown into export, import, manufacturing and real estate. The focus of
his investment is in basic human needs of food, clothing and shelter. He
has incredibly penetrated our livelihood with his products that are
indispensable in every home – from the construction of our abodes to our
dinning tables and even our clothing. Dangote provides, cements, sugar,
salt, flour, rice, spaghetti, macaroni and textile at competitive
prices.
As a nonpartisan and detribalized
businessperson, he is generous to different political parties, religious
groups and cultural institutions. Apart from providing employment to
elite graduates from different ethnic backgrounds, he minimizes the
level of crime by engaging youths who are school leavers in the area of
transportation, packaging, security amongst others.
As a young celebrity, Dangote is not in
the habit of extravagant display of opulence, like some elderly
moneybags who still behave boyishly and organize Owambe parties with
roadblocks to the discomfort of the ordinary citizens. He resists the
temptation of participating in highly lucrative, fast money yielding
ventures like oil business, GSM, hotel business and even airlines,
probably to discourage destructive competition with indigenous
entrepreneurs.
As a self-employed person, with minimum
basic education, he proves that business success can be through
determination, honesty and perseverance; and not necessarily by
acquiring Harvard-Oxford certificates or First-Class academic
qualification. His managerial skill must surely be the envy of economic
professors. Instead of stashing his funds in foreign accounts, a common
feature of fraudulent front and public office looters, Dangote invests
wisely in the productive sector of the Nigerian economy.
Since entrepreneurship and business
ingenuity are not subjected to federal character principle for quota
system, Dangote has never worked in the public service where some staff
engage in malpractices to fulfill their basic needs while the highly
principled and honest civil servants retire wretched. If he were a
retired military general or a public officer, some might have queried
the source of his wealth since it is easy to calculate one’s salary from
first day in office to the retirement age. He is also not in full-time
party-politics where political opponents would have rubbished the name
of his family through smear campaign. If he was an elected public
officer, there could have been allegations against him of treasury
looting, nepotism and selfish acquisition of public properties, since
most politicians seek for donation or borrow money to contest. If he had
lived mostly abroad, there may have been insinuation that he made his
millions from 419, drug trafficking or modern day’s slavery of pimps,
mortuary washers and gutter cleaners in Diaspora.
Dangote explores virgin and untapped areas
to churn out billions in revenue. Not even some states that receive free
monthly allocation from the federation account without any practical
contribution to the national pool, can match his earning from their
internally generated revenue. Their funded public-enterprises retrench
the workforce and still declare losses. In fact, the situation in some
political offices is so pathetic that some states’ executives not only
misapply their monthly allocation from the Federation Account but also
corner their local councils’ funds in the name of joint account to
render as subservient the elected administrators at the grassroots.
The most commendable move he made recently
was his threat to force down the price of cement to the benefit of the
construction industry and property owners. He should be encouraged to
venture into Garri production business where he can force down the
prices of the essential commodities for the teeming masses.
To deny that Dangote does not have
monopoly over some of the commodities in the Nigerian market is to deny
the obvious. Recently he and other notable Nigerians announced their
desire to float a private sector mega company with the name
Transnational Corporation of Nigeria (TCN/Transcorp), which amongst
other things may acquire government-owned refinery, operate strategic
state-owned coys and pioneer status in Agriculture and IT. Even Bill
Gate of USA is never allowed to monopolize the computer world as the
richest man and the originator of software that is used by almost all
the computers in the universe. Dangote should therefore be careful of
the evils of retrogressive monopoly, which weakens government
regulations, and kills healthy competition. It is better to have a fair
share of the market through deployment of infrastructural facilities and
equipment than acquiring public institutions at giveaway prices. A
situation where the nouveau rich find it easy to bid and acquire public
enterprises while the poor, as ordinary citizen without an option for
even meager acquisition may not be fair enough in a republic.
Though private enterprises are established
to declare financial profit, while the public enterprises render
essential and social services to the citizenry, there should therefore
be healthy competitions in achieving public-private sector partnership
instead of outright acquisition or monetization of a sector. The
proponents of privation should consider the deployment of best managers
from private sector to supervise the public companies at a fee. Not
every Nigerian wants to become a businessperson as some of our children
have tall ambition of becoming fearless paramilitary officers, honest
public servants and incorruptible politicians.
If Dangote and other members of TCN/Transcorp
are interested in Nigeria and Nigerians, they can get concessions to
take over our deserted but abundant and fertile lands for mechanized
farming for mass food production. If they want to be more patriotic,
they should channel their surpluses and energies in instituting
educational foundation, where the poor can have easy access to
affordable education and arrest the bastardization of public schools,
which are now breeding centres for touts and certificated illiterates.
They can even invest in university education with lower rate to enrich
our workforce.
Let us pray against an alarming period
when a future generation will wake up to realize that the government
cannot longer provide employment and social services to citizenry due to
monopolized privatization.
NB
This piece was
first written and published in May 2005 and many things could have
changed since then. I find it compelling to submit this as the man
celebrates his 50th Birthday today. I believe like other
genuine investors he has done his best for the nation.
Yushau A. Shuaib
Wuye Estate, Abuja
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