By Kingston Magare 6.5.2026
Billionaire industrialist Aliko Dangote has bemoaned the cost of transportation, movement of goods and services in the Africa.
Mr. Dangote who was speaking during a chat on an investment forum with Makhtar Diop, International Finance Corporation managing director, said it was cheaper to ship goods from Madrid, Spain to Nigeria. He noted that this was a clog on intra-African trade.
“It costs more to ship from Lagos port to Accra than from Spain to Lagos,” Dangote submitted.
“There’s no way you can do trade with your neighbours like this. When we look at the transportation sector, most of the people who own ships that move goods around are not Africans.”
Dangote stated that African economic integration is stagnated because of the absence of cheap and effect mode of transportation.
“Somebody like me, I need 38 visas to move around. How do I invest now if I’m not able to move around? It doesn’t make sense. Nobody has time to keep applying for visas.”
“Without this, there’s no way we are going to have a very prosperous Africa. I cannot move my goods from Lagos to the Republic of Benin, and when you try to cross the border, you can be there for a week—if you are lucky.”