Business
Dangote says waiting for President Ruto to begin work on $17bn Kenyan refinery
Dangote said, he would need Ruto to offer land, some east African finance and, most important, protection from what he called dumping of cheap fuel from the likes of Russia or India.
• Ruto, and Dangote
Aliko Dangote, Africa’s wealthiest industrialist, has stated that he is eyeing Kenya as the site of a huge $17 billion 650,000-barrel-a-day oil refinery he plans to build in east Africa, after questions over a previous push to build the facility in Tanzania.
Tanzanian President Samia Suluhu Hassan last week complained angrily to her Kenyan counterpart William Ruto that she had not been consulted over the earlier plan to build it on her country’s coastline, which was announced in her absence last month at an infrastructure summit.
“I’m leaning more towards Mombasa because Mombasa has a much larger, deeper port,” he told Financial Times in an interview.
He compared Kenya’s port to Tanga, the proposed Tanzanian site for the refinery to process oil from Uganda and the open market.
Dangote estimated it would cost $15 billion to $17 billion to build.“Kenyans consume more.
It’s a bigger economy,” he said, adding that crude oil for the refinery could be transported by ship and need not be located near a pipeline that will carry oil nearly 1,500 kilometres from Ugandan oilfields to the Tanzanian coast at Tanga.“The ball is in the hands of President Ruto,” he said.
“Whatever President Ruto says is what I’ll do,” the Nigerian billionaire added. For the east African refinery to get off the ground, Dangote said, he would need Ruto to offer land, some east African finance and, most important, protection from what he called dumping of cheap fuel from the likes of Russia or India.
“There is no refinery in the world that can survive without that protection,” he said. “If we have an agreement, we can start this year,” he explained. He told the FT he could still build the refinery in Tanzania “if they are able to sort themselves out”.
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Dangote Petroleum Refinery has strongly rejected allegations that its refined petroleum products are exported to Lomé, Togo, and later re-imported into Nigeria.
In a statement issued on Tuesday, the refinery described the claims as “a web of falsehoods,” “baseless,” and “unsubstantiated,” arguing they lack commercial logic and contradict its core business objectives of boosting local production and achieving energy self-sufficiency.
The refinery emphasized that its sales contracts and tender terms explicitly prohibit buyers from reselling or re-importing the products back into Nigeria. It further noted that available trade data and the high costs of round-trip shipping (estimated at US$68–90 per ton) make such a scheme economically unviable.
The allegations surfaced amid reports suggesting that a significant portion of Nigeria’s seaborne fuel imports between March and May 2026 originated from Dangote products rerouted through the offshore ship-to-ship trading hub in Lomé.
Some marketers claimed pricing differences made it cheaper to buy from foreign traders via Togo.
Dangote Refinery dismissed these assertions, insisting there is no evidence to support them and reaffirming its commitment to supplying high-quality fuels directly to the Nigerian market at competitive prices.
The development highlights ongoing tensions as the refinery continues to reduce Nigeria’s reliance on fuel imports.
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