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| Ashish Thakkar, Africa's youngest billionaire |
Africa’s youngest billionaire, Ashish Thakkar, on Monday visited President Goodluck Jonathan with a view to expanding his investment in Nigeria.
Thakkar, who was accompanied by the Special Adviser to the President on Youth Empowerment, Mr. Obinna Adim, told State House correspondents that he had huge confidence in Nigeria because of the opportunities available in the country.
He said he was investing in a number of states in the country and already had 200 employees in Nigeria.
Thakkar added that he had done the ground-breaking of a glass manufacturing plant in Cross River State.
He said over $110m would be committed to the first phase of the project, while the second phase would gulp about $100m.
The billionaire said apart from the existing investments in Information and Communication Technology, he was also considering investment in the agricultural sector.
Thakkar expressed confidence in the Nigerian market and the nation’s future.
When asked for the basis of the confidence, he said, “You can feel it, you can feel the energy, I have been coming here for few years. We have offices in 22 African countries. The CNN recently asked me my favourite country in Africa and I said Nigeria.
“This is something that we are very serious about and we are very confident of.”
On the negative reports on the country, Thakkar said, “There is a huge difference between perception and reality.”
I think the perception happened to be negative today, but it is a very unfortunate case because when we come here, what we see and what we experience show that Nigeria is a very different place.
“Nigeria is going through transformation; and I think Africa as a whole, we are going through transformation and I think one thing as Africans is that we are 54 countries and we generalise in our assessments.”
- The Punch.