Dangote Expands Empire to Fuel Trucking as Union Warns of Strike
(Bloomberg) -- Africa’s richest person has begun trucking fuel from his massive refinery directly to retailers, extending his sprawling empire into one of the most critical sectors of Nigeria’s economy.
Aliko Dangote’s fleet of gas-powered trucks began loading fuel at the refinery’s gantry outside Lagos on Sept. 15 after a successful trial run, the company’s spokesman said.
His decision to begin trucking his own fuel is a strategy that the conglomerate has implemented across its sugar, fertilizer and cement businesses, where it delivers products directly to retailers. It prevents the company from being subject to the pricing whims of transportation companies., Dangote Industries Ltd. Vice-President Devakumar Edwin, told Bloomberg in July.
While only a quarter of Dangote’s planned 4,000 trucks have arrived after an initial holdup from his Chinese supplier, it potentially increases the number of such vehicles on Nigerian roads to more than 35,000, according to an association of truck owners. Nigeria’s poor rail and electricity infrastructure makes commuting dependent on mostly gasoline cars and many businesses run on diesel-powered generators.
The billionaire’s distribution plan has angered unionized truck drivers who are now threatening nationwide protests.
The Nigeria Union of Petroleum and Natural Gas Workers, a powerful lobby of thousands of workers in oil multinationals and the civil service, said it will strike if the refinery’s newly hired drivers aren’t allowed to unionize.
“We are not against him distributing petroleum products,” Nupeng President Williams Akporeha said via text. “Our agitation is the drivers be allowed to be unionized under Nupeng as stipulated in our labor laws,” he said.
A spokesman for Dangote Industries didn’t immediately respond to a text message seeking comment over the union’s threats.
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