Nigeria’s foremost entrepreneur, Aliko Dangote, has been ranked among 75 most powerful persons on the planet, ahead of the Vice President of the United States of America, Mike Pence.
According to the Forbe’s latest 2018 ranking of the World Powerful people, Dangote ranked among world leaders like Chinese president, Xi Jinping; Vladimir Putin, Russian president and Donald Trump, president of the U.S., all of whom were ranked first, second and third respectively.
Dangote was ranked 66th most powerful person in the world ahead of Mike Pence, U.S. Vice-President, ranked 67 and Qamar Javed Bajwa, highly influential Chief of Army Staff of Pakistan who ranked 68.
The Africa’s richest man is the only Nigerian on the list and one of the only two Africans who made the list with the other being the Egyptian President, Abdel Fattah el-Sisi, who was ranked 45th most powerful.
Dangote, it would be recalled, was the only black man who made the list apart from president of the United States, Barack Obama, in the 2016 ranking released in 2017 and was listed at number 71 just above the then American presidential contender, Donald Trump, who was listed at number 72.
Dangote is the Chairman of the Dangote Cement which produces 44 million metric tons annually across the African continent and still plans to expand and increase its output by 33 per cent by 2020.
According to the Forbe’s rich list, Dangote as at March 2018 had an estimated net worth of $14.1 billion and ranked among the 100 richest in the world and the richest in Africa, a position he has held for almost a decade.
Dangote reached the peak in 2014 when he came 23rd richest in the world and in 2013 surpassed the Saudi-Ethiopian billionaire Mohammed Hussein Al Amoudi by over $2.6 billion to become the world richest person of African descent.