Nigerian billionaire Aliko Dangote’s foundation and Gombe State to give 28,284 women refinery shares

Gombe State has released ₦149.2 million ($112,000) to buy shares in Nigerian billionaire Aliko Dangote’s oil refinery for 28,284 vulnerable women, in a partnership with the Aliko Dangote Foundation that will double each woman’s holding.

Governor Muhammadu Inuwa Yahaya approved the counterpart funding, his spokesman Ismaila Uba Misilli said in a statement on Thursday. The state’s money will buy 10 shares for each beneficiary, and the foundation will add another 10, giving every woman 20 shares in Dangote Petroleum Refinery and Petrochemicals. The beneficiaries are spread across the state’s 11 local government areas.

At the offer price of ₦525 a share, each woman’s 20 shares are worth ₦10,500. In total, the program covers about 565,680 shares.

A committee drawn from the state’s ministries of finance and economic development, women affairs and social development, and humanitarian affairs and poverty reduction will coordinate the rollout. The foundation said the partnership would widen economic opportunities for women and their households.

The Gombe deal is part of a wider plan. Dangote has said his foundation will work with state governments to help up to 2 million vulnerable women, including widows and women affected by conflict, buy into the refinery’s initial public offering, with the foundation donating extra shares they can keep as long-term savings.

The foundation set aside ₦40 billion (about $30 million) in early October to match share purchases by students and vulnerable women, according to Arise News. State partnerships such as Gombe’s are how that money reaches beneficiaries, with each government paying for its share of the stock and the foundation adding the rest.

The scheme fits a broader push to bring small investors into the offer. Dangote said this week that applicants seeking ₦50,000 or less of stock will be given priority when shares are allotted.

The refinery is selling 4.1 billion shares at ₦525 each to raise about ₦2.15 trillion ($1.6 billion), the largest IPO in Nigeria’s history. The offer opened on Sept. 14 and was due to close on Oct. 13, but has been extended to Oct. 27.

Demand for the offer appears strong. Dangote has said orders are more than three or four times the target, though no subscription figures have been published. The refinery reported a profit of about $4.7 billion for the first nine months of the year, a figure investors are weighing ahead of the Oct. 27 close.

Dangote, Africa’s richest person, owns about 92% of the refinery in Lekki, Lagos, which reached full refining capacity in February. It is Africa’s largest oil refinery.