Dangote Group to Invest $1 Billion in Zimbabwe Pipeline Project

Nigeria’s Dangote Group will invest $1 billion in a petroleum pipeline project in Zimbabwe, part of the company’s broader plan to expand energy infrastructure across Africa, CEO Aliko Dangote said.

(Reuters) — Nigeria's Dangote Group will invest at least $1 billion in a pipeline, power generation and cement plant in Zimbabwe, its founder and CEO Aliko Dangote said on Nov. 12.

Dangote, Africa's richest man, met Zimbabwe President Emmerson Mnangagwa and signed an investment agreement with the government on Wednesday morning.

"We have just signed an agreement between Zimbabwe and the Dangote Group to do various investments in various sectors some of which are of course cement, power generation and a pipeline to bring petroleum products," Dangote told reporters in Harare.

He said the pipeline would complement the Dangote Group’s plans to establish the biggest oil refinery in the world.

The industrialist previously visited Zimbabwe in 2015, then under the late President Robert Mugabe who was replaced by Mnangagwa after a 2017 coup, but abandoned plans to invest in the southern African country for unclear reasons.

Asked what had changed, Dangote said: "There are quite a lot of changes between that time when we came and now. The government is solid, there is a lot of transparency."

The Dangote Group has operations in 17 African countries and one of its subsidiaries, Dangote Cement, is a leading cement manufacturer on the continent.