In its November 2013 issue, Forbes Africa named 53-year old
Abdulsamad Rabiu of the BUA Group as the latest African billionaire. Read
below an excerpt from the feature:
“An investigation by FORBES AFRICA turned up a string of
assets. The BUA Group has interests in key sectors similar to those of
countryman, Aliko Dangote, Africa’s richest man. They include cement, sugar and
flour. Through the group’s subsidiaries it does business in real estate, steel,
port concessions, manufacturing, oil, gas and shipping.
“The group also owns the ship BUA Cement 1, a 200-meter long
vessel designed for heavy loads. It is Nigeria’s first floating terminal.
“In addition to his assets in the BUA Group, Rabiu owns
property in Britain, worth $62 million, and in South Africa, worth $19 million.
“Among his properties is a house in Gloucester Square in
London worth nearly $16 million and a penthouse at The One & Only Hotel, in
Cape Town, worth $12.6 million.
“Rabiu’s taste for good living is plain to see; he has
bought homes from Eaton Square to Avenue Road, also known as Millionaires’ Row.
“Rabiu jets around the world on an eight-seatre Gulfstream
G550 worth $44.9 million, powered by a Rolls-Royce BR710 turbofan engine, as
well as an $18-million Legacy 600 aircraft.
“Abdulsamad was born in Kano to the family of renown
business man, Ishyaku Rabiu. His father had made his fortune from trading in
the years after Nigeria’s independence.
“By the mid 70s, Abdulsamad’s father had become quite
influential and he was a point man in the political scene. By 1983, the
military coup which led to the arrest of President Shehu Shagari found Ishayku
in incarceration as well.
“During this period, Abdulsamad was away in the US getting
his bachelor’s degree. He returned home at 24 to find his father’s business in
dire straits. With little or no business experience, Abdulsamad had to take
over the reins to restore his father’s now failing business empire.”
As he said to Forbes Africa
“It was very difficult. When we started, our dad was not
there. There was this huge vacuum, because of his personality. He grew the
business, he did everything, everybody reported to him, and then he wasn’t
there anymore.
“So at a very tender age, I was saddled with so many things;
I had to make a lot of important decisions, and don’t forget that this happened
suddenly, at the time, there were three ships being discharged, rice and sugar
ships. The government agencies tried to seize the goods; so we were
discharging, they were taking, we were taking back. It was a big, big issue.
Those kinds of things were really challenging.”
The story of this man is very interesting. He worked his way
to transforming his millions into billions. It was a series of radical decision
after radical decision that has given rise to the empire that Abdulsamad has
built today.
According to him
“The biggest challenge was that there were restrictions on
confirming letters of credit because of the coup. Then there was the issue of
the planes; there were two private jets and we didn’t know what to do with
them. We couldn’t fly them. They actually grounded the jets. We were able to
get the big one out and we decided we didn’t need it. I just got rid of it. [My
father] was in detention, so who was going to be flying a private jet at that
time with the major-general Muhammadu Buhari around. They grounded the small
plane for two years but it was released after [my father] was released from
detention.
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