The Dangote Group has reacted to what it called the “re-launch” of economic sabotage accusations against it, describing the allegation about $3.4 billion economic sabotage as “baseless, malicious and unfounded”.
The group, in the rebuttal, titled: “Economic Sabotage: Our Stand,” recalled that the organisation was alleged to have been probed over illegal foreign exchange deals and money laundering running to $3.4 billion under the watch of a former Governor of the Central Bank of Nigeria, Godwin Emefiele.
Dangote Group recalled that the allegation was spearheaded by a competitor masquerading as a concerned Nigerian in 2016.
It said while some national dailies and online titles declined to publish the story, some published it.
Frustrated, the alleged detractor, the Group said, ended up pushing for and publishing the weighty and spurious allegations as advertorials in two newspapers in the name of David Osa Ighalo, from Benin, the Edo State capital in South South Nigeria.
The publication accused the Group of moving monies from Nigeria to its sister companies outside the country.
It alleged that about $3 billion had been ferried through shady means.
Despite reporting the publications to the Department of State Services and the national dailies that published the advertorial apologising, as well as owing up that the publications were sponsored by Messrs BUA Group, the forces against the Group were unrelenting.
Therefore, the Group said it was baffling to see recently a fresh false slant by another character, Ahmed Fahad, flying a new petition, drawing the attention of President Bola Tinubu and Special Investigator, Jim Obazee, as well as deploying some blogs and social media platforms to give the accusation wider reach, all to the “detriment of its corporate reputation”.
However, Dangote Industry Limited in the rejoinder countered and insisted that it has been conducting its businesses in line with the global best corporate governance practices, extant laws and regulations.
Speaking on its expansion, which was linked to the allegations, Dangote Group said it secured the CBN approval to source FX from the interbank market to fund the construction of the plants.
The Group specified that the CBN gave approvals between 2010 and 2018 to purchase $3.755 billion from the interbank market for the funding of its various African projects, out of which it has utilised only “47.7 percent of the approvals in the total sum of N1.791 billion”.
To this end, Dangote in its four points stand, maintained that FOREX for its foreign projects were sourced from Interbank Foreign Exchange compliance with the CBN approvals and CBN press release dated February 18, 2015.
It affirmed that funds it invested in its expansion projects across African countries are legitimate capital investment in the countries and repatriation of FX in sum of $576 million helps to boost FOREX earnings in Nigeria.
Similarly, the business giant proffered that the funding of construction of the plants from Interbank FX market in line with the CBN directives and relevant periodic progress reports were submitted to the banks for submission to CBN.
More importantly, Dangote Group defended that the regulations of the host nations require in most cases that payment to some local vendors, contractors and supplies are done locally for regulatory and tax purposes.
While stressing that it remains the highest employer of labour in Nigeria outside the government, as well as the highest tax paying company in the country, it reiterated that as a focused group, it has invested more than any local and international investors in Nigeria
Dangote Group said its rejoinder was an attestation “to its openness and transparency in the conduct of all its businesses and operations”.
