DANGOTE’S CROCODILE TEARS

The richest black man on the planet hails from the richest family in West Africa, the Dantata Family. The Dantata dynasty was founded by Alhassan Dantata the patriarch of the family. Three of his children stood out as the richest including Ahmadu Dantata, Aminu Dantata and Sunusi Dantata, the last being the grandfather of Dangote through his mother Mariya Sunusi Dantata. The Sunusi Dantata Family produced the richest Dantata’s, beginning with Usman Amakka who was cut off from his prime in the 80’s when assassins made an attempt on his life and left him as a vegetable, crippled on a wheel chair for the rest of his life. Nasiru Sunusi Dantata became famous with his own version of the round the world in 80 days with his friends partying in the air. Abdulkadir Sunusi Dantata founded the construction giants, Dantata & Sawoe with German partners.  Last, but by far not the least from Sunusi Dantata’s loins is Aliko Dangote, the richest black man on earth. Aliko is ranked the 136 richest person and the number one richest black man on the planet.

Few weeks ago, at the Kano Concerned Citizen conference Dangote lamented “In five years’ time the elite in Kano may not venture outside their homes for fear of the unemployed youths in the state” and he went on to narrate how he was nearly mugged after being recognized, despite being in disguise at Friday prayers in Abuja. Earlier in the month at the Kaduna investment forum, he lambasted the Northern governors for failing as he rolled out statistics of the dire situation in the north having 70% of the landmass, 54% of the population and a mere 21% of Internal Generated Revenue.

We may well ask, what is Dangote doing about it or what has he done? Before I answer that let us first look into the religious and modern ways of alleviating poverty. The first thing we must understand is God has never given anyone wealth for himself and family alone. Wealth is meant to be redistributed that is why God instituted Zakat, a compulsory levy from the rich for the poor to stimulate the economy, reduce the gap between the rich and poor and above all mitigate hatred from the poor towards the rich and express love from the rich down to the poor. The importance and centrality of Zakat was evident in early Islam when the first Caliph, Abubakar, waged wars on defaulters.

Many people don’t realize what is behind the Jews successes, despite having the least population in the world, yet controls political and economic power of the world. The secret is foremost Zakat (compulsory levy) which they abide by to the extent of excommunicating defaulting members. In the wave of the 19^th Century Jewish migration from Europe to America, the Jews even had to station a committee of Rabbi’s that prowled the mouth of the Hudson River in New York, welcome fleeing Jewish refugees and the first thing they demanded before integrating any Jew to their community is surrendering the Zakat to the committee even before settlement. Those that arrived poor must pledge remittance or training other members with any special skill they may have. In today’s America you will never see a Jew at the bottom 5% of professions, but always at the top 10%. Besides, with just 15 million popula tion they won over 70% of all the Novel prizes since 1903, control Banking and Finance, Media and other lucrative businesses. The Muslims on the other hand possess over 60% of the total oil wealth yet we are the most ignorant and poor populations.

Today, the Jews after settling their race to become economically independent have turned their attention towards other races as the biggest philanthropists in the world are mostly Jews. Michael Bloomberg, worth 37 Billion Dollars, gave away 3 billion dollars about 8% of his total wealth, likewise Zuckerberg (Facebook founder) gave away 1.6 billion Dollars that is 4% of his total wealth.

Some years ago, Dangote used to dole out Zakat to people in his family neighborhood but since the death of his Grandfather it was stopped (making one wonder perhaps it was Sunusi forcing him to pay) though he kept doling it out to his staff. I can remember an incidence almost 2 decades ago when Dr. Abdullahi Bature was his Foundation Chairman, I visited the office and had an interview with one of the managers asking him why are they delaying in paying out Zakat. The man told me that usually as the season approached (Ramadan) the 2.5% for Zakat was taken out and lodged in a fixed deposit account for a specified time and the interest accrued from the deposit was later taken out and distributed to the poor while the original 2.5% was taken back to company account. Instead of continuing the zakat tradition, Dangote preferred to promote Almajiranci by sponsoring his mother to be feeding Almajirai daily. Some poor people from rural areas even made the surrounding neighborhood of her home as permanent residence in order to access the lunch and dinner doled out to them. Even though, feeding the poor is a good act initiated by the Dantata patriarch several decades ago, then it didn’t encourage almajiranci as it does now.

Dangote was shedding crocodile tears simply because he has a lot to offer Kano people but failed. We are not advocating that he should continue giving the zakat, no, we are pleading with him to invest in our economy. He has invested 12 Billion dollars in Lagos to build one of the largest refineries in the world, also the cement factories in Benue and Kogi, rice farming in Jigawa and Katsina but nothing for Kano. We have over 16 dams in Kano that could sustain all year round farming of wheat and rice, be a good chance to initiate ranches clusters around those dams that could bring in huge profit for him and save our herdsmen from venturing into the south in search of pasture and the attendant agricultural value chain the state would benefit from.

Dangote should have a scholarship for our students considering we have the greatest deficit in education, he should even build a University that could sustain itself, promotes arts and craft by Dangote Awards and start-up grants for enterprising business proposals. If Dangote could dedicate 1 billion dollars for such activities it will transform the north. If a Jew can sacrifice 8% of his total wealth for humanity, why not a Muslim dedicate 2.5% for his people?

Job creation is where Dangote has failed in Kano, yet lamenting about it. The only company he owned and manages in Kano is Dangote Flour. The Dangote farms, Danhydro, Dansa, Textile etc were all owned, managed and eventually ruined by his brother Sani Gote, earning him to be on the published list of defaulting Bank debtors in the country. The Tomato paste company at Chiromawa was created about six years ago with the intention to save the wastage our farmers and the economy faced every season. Unfortunately instead of the managers to first of all secure and distribute seedling suited for such purpose they asked them to bring the variety they used to farm and exorbitantly demand the tomato be sucked before being weighed. The farmers seeing that as a loss refused to supply the company their products thus the company remained idle for years until recently when they begin to implement more favorable policies on procurement.

The Songhai Farms at Dutsin-Ma in Katsina State that was recently acquired by Dangote reiterate to me the man is only thinking of getting profit without giving back to the society. I have visited the 24 Hectares farm and have never been amazed in my life. It was a branch of Songhai International that was created by a Benin Republic pastor and promoting the knowledge and system of that farm alone could revolutionize agriculture in the north. They practiced sustainable agriculture and teach the knowledge as an institute. Their researches were fascinating, cost effective and applicable. In soil improvement, they went back to old farming techniques used by our ancestors before the introduction of fertilizers, pesticides and insecticides. Without adding any foreign element to the soil they harness manure on farms, use some natural leaves that were liquefied to produce pesticides and insecticides and it kills all the germs and bacteria in the manure, which will then be spread along the farm and the harvest on that farm would yield eight times multiple what a normal fertilizer could yield. They also generate bio-fuel from the waste on the farm for gas in their kitchens. They have means to preserve milk in cans without any preservatives and refrigeration for six months. Using natural cross breeding they generate hybrids plants that can withstand the rigors of our climate, for example they gave me a tomato and asked to keep in my kitchen without refrigeration and it will not go rotten for two weeks. It is the only place I have ever seen up north that pineapple could grow, as they use special knowledge. Instead of Dangote to promote this farm and make its knowledge accessible to farmers in our region, he transforms it to rice farm alone.

With over ten million Almajiri’s (about 10% of the population in the north) roaming our streets, growing without basic education, parental or societal care and the recent trend of banditry and kidnap, five years of Dangote’s predictions may even be far off. Five years ago we are talking about Boko Haram, nothing of Banditry and Kidnap is on our minds but today here we are. The solution to our problem is obvious, education and redistribution of wealth, anything short of that is cosmetic and won’t work. Instead of lamentations we need to be proactive and act very fast or else when the roof comes tumbling down it will be a chain-reaction that will either consume or subsume us.