Aliko Dangote, Africa’s richest person, says he still faces difficulties travelling in Africa with his Nigerian passport.
Dangote spoke recently at the Africa CEO Forum Annual Summit
in Kigali, Rwanda.
“I still complained to President Kagame. I told him that as
an investor, I have to now apply for 35 different visas on my passport, and I
told Mr. President, I really don’t have the time to go and be dropping my
passports in embassies to get a visa,” he said.
“But you see, the most annoying thing is that yes, if you
are treating everybody the same, then I can understand.”
Using the French passport as an example, Dangote said
Patrick Pouyanne, chairman of Total Energies, does not need 35 visas on his
French passport to gain access to African countries.
“You don’t need 35 visas on your French passport. This means
you have a freer movement than myself in Africa,” he said.
Speaking further on businesses within Africa, he said right
now, “our main job is to make sure the regional markets all work. Once they
work, then we can now go to Africa Continental Free Trade Agreement (AfCFTA).
But then, for AfCFTA also, we need to make sure that it works”.
“We cannot have a
very promising continent and our intra-trade rate is less than 16 percent.
Okay, so we Africans will have to do it. If we are waiting for foreigners to
come and do it, both the development of Africa, it’s not going to happen,” he
said.
“So it can only happen to us Africans. We must risk our
sources and make sure that we lead, then we will have people who actually trust
and believe in Africa like Patrick to come and help us to push to the next
level.”
Also, at the event, the business mogul announced that
Nigeria will not have to import petrol into the country by June when Dangote
refinery commences production of the product.
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