Aliko Dangote is now a coal miner as Tanzania has offered his Dangote Cement Company in the southeastern town of Mtwara, land to mine coal for its operations, Vanguard reports.
A 10-square-kilometre plot of land was handed to the company by Tanzania’s Ministry of Energy and Minerals at the weekend.
The $500 million cement factory was set up in 2015 by Africa’s richest man, Aliko Dangote with an annual capacity of 3 million tonnes.
The move was sanctioned by President John Magufuli to allow the company get a reliable supply of coal to fuel its activities, this According to local media; The Citizen.
Tanzania has banned the importation of coal from South Africa. Tancoal, the only one coal producing company in the country, cannot meet the entire market demand.
Dangote runs on expensive diesel generators and requested Tanzanian government support last year to supply natural gas at a reduced price.
President Magufuli later intervened after a meeting with Nigerian billionaire and the company’s owner Aliko Dangote over stalled negotiations on prices.
He blamed middlemen for the delay in supply plans and said Dangote “will now buy natural gas directly from the state-run TPDC (Tanzania Petroleum Development Corporation)”.
Dangote, Africa’s biggest cement producer, is seeking to double Tanzania’s annual output of cement to 6 million tonnes. It also plans to roll out plants across Africa, Africanews reports.
