Chairman of Dangote Group, Alhaji Aliko Dangote, and former Managing Director, United Bank for Africa Plc, Mr. Tony Elumelu, have been selected along with three other individuals for the 2012 edition of the Forbes Africa Person of the year award.
The other persons are Dr. James Mwangi, Chief Executive Officer/Managing Director, Equity Bank Limited, Kenya; Joyce Banda, President of Malawi and Stephen Saad, Co-founder, Aspen Pharmacare.
According to a statement by Forbes Africa, Dangote, Elumelu and the others were nominated by its readers because of their impact on African business in the past year.
The magazine said the Forbes Africa Person of the Year award would go to the individual who has had the most influence on events of the year gone by, adding that with the release of the final shortlist, voting has started on the magazine’s website.
The magazine said voting would close on Thursday, November 1, 2012, and the Forbes Africa Person of the Year would be revealed in an event in Nigeria.
“Aliko Dangote and Tony Elumelu are two Nigerians who made the final five. Dangote was there also last year before the awards was won by fellow country man and Governor, Central Bank of Nigeria, CBN, Sanusi Lamido Sanusi who did not make the final cut this year,” the magazine maintained.
On the nominees, Forbes said Aliko Dangote, founder and president of Dangote Group, last year’s runner-up to Forbes Africa Person of the Year, is still Africa’s richest man worth more than $11.2 billion. Dangote continues to be one of the continent’s biggest employers. He promises to donate most of his fortune to charitable causes upon his retirement.
“Dr James Mwangi won the Ernst & Young Entrepreneur of the Year Award 2012 as well as Africa’s Innovation Leader of the Year Award in 2012. Equity Bank is planning to extend its financial services to Ethiopia when the country opens its banking industry for foreign investors.
“Banda, Malawi’s first female leader, has restored strained diplomatic ties with neighbours and the international community. Her administration has embraced investor friendly economic policies; she cut her salary by 30 per cent; sold the presidential jet and a fleet of luxury cars in austerity drive.
“Tony Elumelu, the multi-millionaire, grooms African business leaders and enterpreneurs through the Tony Elumelu Foundation. He is the leading advocate of Africapitalism, an economic philosophy that embodies the private sector’s commitment to Africa’s economic transformation through long-term investments.
“Stephen Saad is the biggest shareholder of the largest publicly traded drug manufacturer, Aspen. The company has a market capitalisation of $6 billion. Saad became a multimillionaire at 29. Now aged 47, he employs more than 6,000 people.”
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