THE President of Dangote Group, Aliko Dangote, has expressed regret over his failure to buy the Premiership club Arsenal when he desired to own a football club.
The business mogul said he regretted not buying the English club when its value was $2 billion.
He stated this in an interview with Bloomberg’s Francine Lacqua in New York on Monday, September 23.
Dangote said he used his resources to build a refinery instead of buying Arsenal Football Club.
The billionaire stated that he no longer considers purchasing the club.
“But you know everything has gone up and the club too is doing very well, Arsenal is doing extremely well right now. That time, Arsenal wasn’t doing well.
“I think I don’t have that kind of excess liquidity to go and buy a club for $4 billion so to speak and use it as a promotional something.
“But what I will do is to continually be the biggest fan of Arsenal. I watch their games anytime they are playing. So, I will remain a major supporter of Arsenal but I don’t think it makes sense today to buy Arsenal,” Dangote stated.
Dangote had expressed interest in acquiring Arsenal Football Club in 2020, after the commencement of work on his refinery and chose to focus on the refinery.
During the interview with Bloomberg, Dangote urged the Nigerian government to abolish the fuel subsidy regime, emphasising that it is a costly intervention.
He pointed out that fuel subsidies lead to the government “paying what they are not supposed to be paying,” which is a compelling reason to scrap the subsidy altogether ¹.
Dangote stressed that the President Bola Tinubu-led administration could not afford to continue shouldering the financial burden of petrol subsidies.
President Tinubu declared an end to fuel subsidies in his inaugural address on May 29, 2023, but media reports showed how he covertly reinstated it due to rising inflation.
Dangote’s call to end fuel subsidies comes as his mega refinery in Lagos begins operation.
The entrance of Dangote Petrochemical Refinery into Nigeria’s downstream petroleum sector has come with expectations, one of which is the possible reduction of petrol costs.
Rather than decline, petrol prices in the country have jumped, as the product’s sole importer, the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation Limited (NNPCL) hiked the prices.
In a report, The ICIR explained why petrol prices remained despite Dangote Refinery’s entrance into the nation’s markets.
A reporter with the ICIR
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