In Lagos, savvy entrepreneurs in the beauty business face-off the Covid-19 economic crisis by glamming up their online offerings.



From always being fascinated by brushes and make-up products and their ability to enhance a person’s physical appeal, Rasheeda Adeosun, one of Nigeria’s leading make-up artists today, was close to this profession from the beginning. When she was about seven years old, her mother ran a hair-dressing salon in Lagos, where Adeosun would spend most of her time but the interest in taking up beauty as a career came much later in life when she herself became a mother, to three children.



“While I was pregnant, I was working for Lloyds in their headquarters in the United Kingdom and I fell really ill. After I had my twins, my husband said ‘your friends are always coming around asking you to do make-up so why don’t you do something like that’. Obviously being at home, I said I will give it a try,” recalls Adeosun. She posted her wedding pictures on Facebook and people began to take note of her talent.



“People were like ‘who did your make up’, and I said ‘I did it myself’. That is when business started booming. A number of bloggers, like Linda Ikeji, posted [about] me and that is when the customers started coming in.”



But the early days were a struggle. Unlike today’s standards in the beauty business – characterized by significant access to resources and industry entrepreneurs, who can provide mentorship, as well as practically no barriers to entry due to platforms like YouTube and Instagram – Adeosun had no one that would help turn her passion for make-up into a business.



“So, I used to work for nothing and sometimes I would only have £20 left but I always say to people not all free jobs are bad jobs and I did a lot of free jobs in the beginning but I always say I gained a client later,” says Adeosun.



But that was a very long time ago. Today, she is one of the most sought-after make-up artists in the UK and Nigeria, with her established brand, OTS Beauty, boasting some of Africa’s leading celebrities like Tiwa Savage, as exclusive clients. The bridal look has undergone an overhaul. New-age make-up artists like Adeosun are the reason behind it. She has perfected her signature style which comprises of natural and contemporary looks in tune with the trend and she has gained a reputation of amping up the glam quotient of brides on their big day.



<figure class="wp-block-image size-large"><img decoding="async" loading="lazy" width="1024" height="1024" src="https://www.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/08/2126DAE2-6F04-4487-8092-DAD55E4E00CD-1024x1024.jpg" alt="" class="wp-image-47303" srcset="https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/08/2126DAE2-6F04-4487-8092-DAD55E4E00CD-1024x1024.jpg 1024w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/08/2126DAE2-6F04-4487-8092-DAD55E4E00CD-300x300.jpg 300w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/08/2126DAE2-6F04-4487-8092-DAD55E4E00CD-100x100.jpg 100w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/08/2126DAE2-6F04-4487-8092-DAD55E4E00CD-600x600.jpg 600w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/08/2126DAE2-6F04-4487-8092-DAD55E4E00CD-150x150.jpg 150w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/08/2126DAE2-6F04-4487-8092-DAD55E4E00CD-768x768.jpg 768w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/08/2126DAE2-6F04-4487-8092-DAD55E4E00CD-1536x1536.jpg 1536w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/08/2126DAE2-6F04-4487-8092-DAD55E4E00CD-2048x2048.jpg 2048w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/08/2126DAE2-6F04-4487-8092-DAD55E4E00CD-80x80.jpg 80w" sizes="(max-width: 1024px) 100vw, 1024px" /><figcaption>Rasheeda Adeosun of OTS Beauty</figcaption></figure>



<blockquote class="wp-block-quote">&#8220;I used to work for nothing and sometimes I would only have £20 left but I always say to people not all free jobs are bad jobs and I did a lot of free jobs in the beginning but I always say I gained a client later.&#8221;</blockquote>



This has created a huge demand for her bridal make-up services, which constitute a bulk of her revenue. In addition to this, she can charge a premium for campaigns, video shoots and photoshoots. She charges a uniform price for both celebrities and regular clients, often bringing in anywhere from £3,000-£4,000 on a good month.



But like many industries, the Covid-19 pandemic has meant that entrepreneurs like Adeosun are now faced with an uncertain future as economies continue to implement physical restrictions in a desperate attempt to curb the spread of the marauding virus. Adeosun has seen her biggest cash cow all but vanish overnight. This has led her to pivot her brand to survive the new normal.



“I am now doing a lot of online stuff. Most of my following is not from the UK but rather from Nigeria and Ghana. So, doing online classes has helped. Even though it hasn’t brought in the type of money I am used to, it has helped me make ends meet. Also selling lashes online has helped me to bring in money,” says Adeosun.



There is really no business that has not faced the wrath of Covid-19 as more and more enterprises are being forced to shut their doors due to the nationwide lockdowns in place.



<figure class="wp-block-image size-large"><img decoding="async" loading="lazy" width="682" height="1024" src="https://www.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/08/IMG_3503-682x1024.jpg" alt="" class="wp-image-47304" srcset="https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/08/IMG_3503-682x1024.jpg 682w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/08/IMG_3503-300x450.jpg 300w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/08/IMG_3503-600x901.jpg 600w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/08/IMG_3503-200x300.jpg 200w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/08/IMG_3503-768x1153.jpg 768w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/08/IMG_3503-1023x1536.jpg 1023w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/08/IMG_3503.jpg 1364w" sizes="(max-width: 682px) 100vw, 682px" /><figcaption>Nnenna Okoye of Youtopia Beauty</figcaption></figure>



Nnenna Okoye is an Accounting and Finance graduate from the University of Kent in Canterbury in the UK and is now a beauty entrepreneur. She is the owner of Youtopia Beauty, which initially began as an online beauty shop but has over the years morphed into a physical space offering everything from beauty products to skin serums. A bad case of acne, which lasted for over eight months, was the catalyst that helped her to pivot from her nine-to-five job and enter the scary world of beauty entrepreneurship.



“At the time I thought ‘what can you do with your eyes closed’ and you know you love doing and enjoy doing it and still make money from it. And products were the only thing I knew how to do but it was scary and I didn’t know where to start from,” says Okoye.



After failing to get local products that would help her with her acne problem, she had to resort to ordering the products from abroad.



That was when she had her eureka moment. From a beauty blog, she broadened her horizons into the world of beauty distribution and created an e-commerce site where customers in Nigeria could order online. Once business took off, she began introducing her own line of branded cosmetics, the first of which was her best-selling Youskin Vitamin C Serum.



“I felt that vitamin C is the most essential product in every beauty routine especially in Africa where we have exposure to the sun and a lot of pollution. We have about eight products in our line today,” says Okoye.



The company has had to make several changes to its business model over the years. Firstly, Okoye’s dream of creating the Amazon for beauty products was short-lived due to the logistical challenges in Nigeria.



“When I started, people did not have that trust to use their cards online and they had Jumia, which had an order without paying method but they are a much bigger company so they could afford to do that but we couldn’t. So, we had to devise a method where we could also do it properly,” says Okoye.



Her Nigerian consumers wanted to see the products and have a mini consultation before purchasing and it soon became apparent that Okoye would need to open a physical space in order to attract her consumers.



And that is exactly what she did. Youtopia Beauty now had a physical address and an online presence and the move led to an influx of sales.



Since then, the company has been enjoying unprecedented growth. In addition to Youtopia Beauty and Youskin, Okoye subsequently launched the Beauty Hub, a one-stop shop catering service for all the beauty needs of the Nigerian woman. Then disaster struck. Nigeria’s Covid-19 lockdown order came into effect in March and since then, Okoye’s beauty space has remained closed.



“Since the lockdown, we have seen a total decline in people walking into the Beauty Hub which has been disastrous. I shut down completely because we couldn’t do anything due to the curfew in place in Lagos. In the middle of May, I decided not to stop selling,” says Okoye.



Luckily, her major sales came from the distribution of her products, which were still being sold in essential shops like pharmacies and supermarkets that were still allowed to open their doors during the lockdown.



“Because of the pandemic, people couldn’t go out and now people who didn’t care about their skin decided that this is the time to focus on skincare. So, we are selling out on our skin products with some of our lines selling about 100 soaps a day. I have actually seen my numbers rise in the skincare products category but not the make-up line and Beauty Hub,” says Okoye.



Kwame Opoku, CEO of Reset Global and a futurist, describes the trend of increasing sales in the beauty industry during a pandemic as the ‘Lipstick Index’. “Research has shown that historically, an increase in lipstick sales occurred during difficult times like the 9/11 crisis in 2001. This was first established by Estée Lauder who saw their lipstick sales double during this period and this is used as a reliable metric to gauge consumer confidence,” says Opoku.



Kika Osunde and Chioma Ikokwu are the owners of Good Hair, a high-end provider of quality hair products for the discerning and upwardly-mobile professional woman. The starting prices for their hair units can fetch up to a $1,000 a piece. Over the years, the brand, which the women started when they met in university over 12 years ago, has attracted the crème de la crème of society like the First Lady of Ghana and the wives of politicians.



“We saw a gap in the market. There were less than 10 people selling hair and it would sometimes take you up to a year to find a good supplier. So, the market was ready for us. Girls our age could not attain and have access to luxury hair. We always knew we wanted to be a luxury brand and fresh and we targeted young professionals, our aunties and affluent people,” says Osunde.



Their love for premium hair has been supported by their wealthy clientele over the years, which has resulted in the two diversifying their brand with a presence in the UK as well as launching the Good Hair Space in Nigeria with a beauty salon, a barbershop as well as a restaurant and bar.



Today, however, the hair market is a lot different. They have still stuck to their unflinching compromise for good quality hair but are no longer the only players in the space. Instead of only a few suppliers, there are now thousands of people selling hair. The proliferation of social media means it is easier to find suppliers from all over the world. Furthermore, cheap hair products from China provide affordable alternatives to premium hair which has created a mass market.



<figure class="wp-block-image size-large"><img decoding="async" loading="lazy" width="682" height="1024" src="https://www.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/08/Facetune_09-07-2020-20-47-12.jpg" alt="" class="wp-image-47307" srcset="https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/08/Facetune_09-07-2020-20-47-12.jpg 682w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/08/Facetune_09-07-2020-20-47-12-300x450.jpg 300w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/08/Facetune_09-07-2020-20-47-12-600x901.jpg 600w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/08/Facetune_09-07-2020-20-47-12-200x300.jpg 200w" sizes="(max-width: 682px) 100vw, 682px" /><figcaption>Kika Osunde</figcaption></figure>



“Even though the salon is closed, we are still selling hair to clients in Nigeria and the UK,” says Ikokwu. “In Nigeria, we offer a product and a service and in London, we only offer a product. So now, we focus on selling our products. We have started creating more content to increase the demand of our hair units and sales have surged during this period. We definitely fall into the lipstick index- the only thing that has changed for us is the delivery times as the post office wasn’t open six days a week anymore in the UK.”



For most entrepreneurs in the beauty space, content remains king. Providing engaging content to their followers either through tutorials and giveaways to keep online audiences engaged has become the new norm if they want to keep building brand loyalty. The Covid-19 pandemic has led to changes in every industry and for the beauty sector, these new changes will require entrepreneurs to put in more hours in front of the camera and utilize social media to remain connected to their consumers, until the world returns to a semblance of its former self.

CHI2

Nigeria’s Beauty Entrepreneurs: Making Up For Lost Business

Xavi has just got the ball from Sergio Busquets; Casillas makes the run to the edge of the penalty area as he receives the ball, dribbles past one opponent before playing a through-ball for Zidane, who lays it on for Iniesta on the left wing. Iniesta curls in a cross; Christiano Ronaldo rises at the far post to meet it with a powerful header –goal! The stadium erupts in thunderous cheer with cameras synchronizing in a blinding daze of flashes.
Unfortunately, this is not the commentary for a charity match with legendary players from the upper strata of football. There are no cameras in sight and instead of pristine, beautifully landscaped Astro Turf, we have sandy and rocky grounds.
Representing their icons are Obinna ‘Xavi’, Balo ‘Sergio Busquets’, Tola ‘Casillas’, Dayo ‘Zidane’ and Kola ‘Ronaldo’. We are in Lagos, Nigeria, watching the final game between two under-17 teams in the local league cup. The winner gets bragging rights as well as some products from a local FCMG brand.
Football is an overwhelming moment of beauty, spirit and pride and in the most populous country in Africa, that passion is palpable. Gianni Infantino, FIFA President, who was in Lagos at the maiden edition of the AITEO-Nigerian Football Federation (NFF) Awards this year, summed up this love perfectly.
“I was told that in Nigeria, football is passion, but it is a lie because it is more than that. In Nigeria, I was told that football is love, but it is a lie it is more than that. In Nigeria, I was told that football is a religion, but it is a lie. It is more than that. In Nigeria, football is life,” he says in his opening address to a room full of corporate executives, the upper echelons of power in government as well as the hall of fame of Nigerian football.
<blockquote>“Football is also business; when we can harness it properly, a lot of money can be made for the country through the game.”</blockquote>
The country’s love affair with the sport has blossomed over the years into an obsessive relationship. At a buka (local restaurant) in Surulere, a waiter is nearly slapped by an angry fan when he mistakenly changes the channel from a game between Chelsea and Man U to Soundcity, the indigenous 24-hour music channel that is a favorite of most of its diners.
After a heated exchange, the manager apologizes for the interruption and the game is back on. Commonsense is restored. Although this is a repeat match, the men watch intensely with the same passion and vigor of a live game.
“We found that football is the main pull for customers to our restaurant. They are passionate about football. It has turned into a family. Our customers come from all over Lagos to watch the games and once they are here, they have to eat and drink so it’s a win-win for us,” says Nnamdi Mayowa, owner of the restaurant.
As he speaks, a cheer rings out from outside the restaurant. Hordes of football fans have gathered to also catch a glimpse of the action and as any good football story goes, it all began with the kick of the ball in 1945.
That year, the Nigerian Football Federation was introduced as the governing body for the sport. Nigeria subsequently began participating in Africa’s Challenge Cup in the 1960s. Since then, the national team known affectionately as ‘The Super Eagles’, have had a fair number of successes. They won bronze medals in the 1978 and 1979 African Cup of Nations (AFCON) and in 1980, they won the championship in Lagos.
In 1984 and 1988, Nigeria subsequently captured silver medals in the tournament. Football had come to stay and with it a number of international stars were born and shipped to some of the world’s most successful football clubs with lucrative deals.
Then came the dark years. In 2010, Nigeria finished bottom of their group in South Africa with just one point from three matches after losing to Argentina and Greece and drawing with South Korea. In response, the then President Goodluck Jonathan banned the team from competing in the sport for two years. Then followed their exit at the 2014 World Cup where they lost to France, and a subsequent failure to qualify for the 2015 and 2017 editions of the AFCON. Nigerian football morale was at an all-time low.
Finally, a shimmer of light emerged at the end of the tunnel. The Super Eagles breezed through their group stage of the FIFA World Cup Qualifiers to earn a spot as one of only five African countries to make it to Russia 2018.
They were unbeaten in six matches with four wins and two draws, scoring 12 goals and only conceding four times, an incredible feat that took the team, led by German tactician, Gernot Rohr, to their sixth FIFA World Cup.
For Nigerians of this era, there is no sporting moment more significant than this triumph, especially as it is achieved against a backdrop of a sputtering economy that has gripped the country since the fall in crude oil prices and the Foreign Exchange (FX) fiasco of 2016 and 2017. The 2019 elections are also on the horizon and with it, greater economic uncertainty for Nigerians. The country has been increasingly marred by public dissent reflecting the mounting anger over an absentee president. To make matters worse, Nigeria has more than 300 tribes, making a consensus of any kind at the best of times, almost impossible to reach.
“We call football the unifying factor. When Nigeria is playing everyone comes together, we forget our tribes, we forget our differences, we even forget our religion. We all hug together when we do well and we all sulk together when we lose. Football is also business; when we can harness it properly, a lot of money can be made for the country through the game,” says Akin Alabi, founder of NairaBET, a leader in a wide range of betting opportunities on all sports.
Having attended two World Cups, South Africa in 2010 and Brazil in 2014, Alabi firmly has his eyes set on Russia.
“I want them to get to a quarter appearance. That will be the best-case scenario for me because I do not think we have gotten further than that,” he says.
However, he is quick to point out that this is not Nigeria’s strongest team.
“I think our 1994 team was fantastic. We do not have the caliber of players we had then, but no one has the perfect team out there. This is a national team and not like pro football where you can take money and buy whichever player you want. You have to make do with those that are available from the country you are from. So we are hoping it goes well,” says Alabi.
He believes the prospects of an African country actually bringing back the cup is far-fetched. Countries like Germany for example have a well-oiled football development machine, which helps them churn out a lot of quality players, which any African team cannot match right now.
“The German team is called a German machine for a reason, they have a well-oiled team and continuity. Their manager has been there for years on various World Cups so everything is run professionally. In Nigeria and Africa, when it is time for a match, we just invite players to run and play so that cannot work. We need better development in terms of processes,” says Alabi.
However, Brian Okonkwo is adamant Nigeria will go all the way to the finals. But then again, he would be. As a member of the Nigeria Football Supporters Club, he has dedicated his life to the advancement of the sport that saved his life as a troubled youth.
“When I was younger I used to be in an armed robbery gang and we did a lot of bad things to innocent people. I was on a fast track to jail or death but luckily, someone from my family was able to help me turn over a new leaf by introducing me to football,” says Okonkwo.
He has been present in all Nigeria’s five World Cup appearances in the past.
<a href="http://www.forbesafrica.com/sport/2014/11/01/african-football-cup-aces-sleeve/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">READ MORE: African, Football, Cup Up Aces’ Sleeve</a>
“I think we have everything it takes to bring this home for our people, the team simply needs the support of the country behind them and that is our job. We are with them all the way and we need the resources to enable us to do our job,” says Okonkwo.
According to the Club’s National Chairman, Samuel Ikpea, the club will take 1,000 people to Russia to cheer and support the Super Eagles. This means 1,000 visa applications, 1,000 hotel rooms and 1,000 mouths to feed for the duration of the Russia 2018 tournament.
“Football is a passion of the nation and we do this job out of love for the sport. We have been in this business for a long time and we are already sourcing for funds to ensure that we get to Russia. Unfortunately, it is difficult because we have not been able to receive any funds from the Nigeria Football Federation (NFF) or the ministry of sports since this new government came,” says Ikpea.
According to Ikpea, this differs to the previous government who invested $140,000 to help them cover expenses to support the Super Eagles in the last World Cup.
“Teams like Nigeria come into the World Cup and historically something happens. They look great in the qualifiers then everything falls apart, something happens with the federation, somebody doesn’t get paid and now all of a sudden this team is in disarray going into the competition,” says Marcus Dawson, a sports commentator for Metro TV.
In the absence of adequate infrastructure, and in spite of the paucity of training facilities, football is played on streets, paths or fields. The potential of the sport has not been realized in the country due to the lack of support from corporate organizations that only see football as a CSR initiative instead of a lucrative business venture.
As a result, the NFF is fighting to ensure the team has adequate resources to efficiently compete in Russia. According to Amaju Pinnick, President of the NFF, the organization is working on generating $2.8 million for the Super Eagles’ participation in the games.
“Failure is not an option in the FIFA World Cup and we need to come together to ensure we provide the team with everything they need to make it through,” says Pinnick.
The organization receives support from private organizaitons like Aiteo who have a focus on developing the quality of football in Nigeria. So far, Aiteo has paid the sum of $600,000 and $890,000 to cover its contractual obligation of providing support to the technical crew of the Super Eagles for the whole of 2018, well beyond the World Cup, according to Deputy Managing Director, Francis Peters.
<a href="http://www.forbesafrica.com/sport/2016/12/01/wounded-swallows-roast-football-hell/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">READ MORE: Wounded Swallows Roast In Football Hell</a>
This however pales in comparison to investment in sports by their European counterparts. In a little more than a decade, Germany has invested nearly $1 billion in its youth soccer programs, with academies run by professional teams and training centers overseen by the national soccer association, the Deutscher Fussball Bund, according to a report in The New York Times.
Also of grave concern was the issue of the selection process for the team, which sparked widespread debates across the country. Like the case of Sone Aluko, a professional football player, who is a striker for Fulham FC but could not make it on the coveted team shortlist.
“The NFF is not responsible for making the selection of who joins the team. That is the decision of the coach. I know the story of Sone but unfortunately we are just focused on getting the team ready for Russia 2018,” says Pinnick.
Colin Udoh, a leading journalist and sports presenter, shares his insights on the team selection methodology used by the coach.
“It is the coach that selects not the federation even though they have some sway in the decision but ultimately it is the call of the coach. But yes, Sunday Oliseh, who was the previous coach, said he likes to pick players from the top division and I think most coaches in Nigeria want players who are playing at the highest level and the very best in the world rather than those playing in the lower division,” he says.
Secondly, Udoh claims that most European coaches like Rohr will not admit this is what they do. An additional criteria, which Rohr has also added to this team’s selection process evident in the team representing the Super Eagles, is the attempt to lower the average age of the players to 23 years except for John Mikel Obi, Leon Balogun and the goalkeeper where he is trying to integrate a bit of experience into team. So on these two key criteria, most players like Aluko unfortunately will fall out of contention.
“He is not in the top division and he also happens to be 28 years. I would pick him in a heartbeat but unfortunately I am not the coach. If you look at the way the team have qualified for the World Cup, you cannot argue with the results. Apart from that one loss against South Africa, Rohr has masterminded the success of the team to qualify for the World Cup and it is going to be hard to argue with that result,” adds Udoh.
It has been a long road to get here. Nigeria could qualify through the group stages by having the best balance of exciting promise and solidity. In every nook and cranny, and from every social stratum and walk of life, one thing is undeniable, and that is the game of football permeates every aspect of Nigerian culture, and Russia 2018 is another opportunity for the country to put away the differences and unite for this all-important goal.
After all, football in Nigeria is life.
<div id="attachment_36279" style="width: 1034px" class="wp-caption aligncenter"><img aria-describedby="caption-attachment-36279" decoding="async" loading="lazy" class="wp-image-36279 size-large" src="https://www.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/05/GettyImages-161373524-1024x682.jpg" alt="" width="1024" height="682" srcset="https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/05/GettyImages-161373524-1024x682.jpg 1024w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/05/GettyImages-161373524-300x200.jpg 300w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/05/GettyImages-161373524-600x399.jpg 600w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/05/GettyImages-161373524-768x511.jpg 768w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/05/GettyImages-161373524.jpg 2048w" sizes="(max-width: 1024px) 100vw, 1024px" />Nigeria&#8217;s supporters celebrate after their team scored the opening goal against Burkina Faso during the 2013 African Cup of Nations. Photo Getty Images.</div>

FBL-WC-2018-QUALIFIER-NGR-CMR

Nigeria; Where Football Is Life

On a rainy Tuesday morning in Lekki, Lagos in Nigeria, 12-year old Ezinne Ibrahim runs frantically after a moving bus balancing a heavy load of bottled groundnuts on a tray on her head with one hand and a bottle in the other hand.
As she gets closer to the bus’s open window, a passenger hurriedly reaches out to snatch the bottle from her and tosses N500 ($1) on the ground before the bus speeds off. Ibrahim bends to pick up the drenched note, narrowly avoiding being hit by a truck from the opposite side of the road. She quickly scans the oncoming traffic for potential customers before crossing the road to get cover from the heavy downpour.
“I am here from six in the morning until 10PM with my mother,” says Ibrahim. Her mother, 45-year-old Sade, expertly weaves between traffic lanes, sells two bottles of groundnuts before joining us under the shed.
“I have been selling on the streets for the past eight years now and that is how I earn a living to feed my family. We used to sell in Victoria Island last year but we changed locations because this area has a lot more traffic and that means more money. I know it is dangerous for Ezinne and I never wanted her to do this but I cannot afford to put her into school,” says Sade.
On a good day, they make roughly N20,000 ($55). If life is already hard, it has gotten a lot harder for the pair over the past couple of years.
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Kick Against Indiscipline (KAI), Lagos state’s environment law enforcement unit established in 2003 by the government to enforce environmental law in the state, is a constant threat to street hawkers.
“We get harassed several times a week by the task force. They arrest us and detain us for hours before releasing us if we pay them something,” says Bayo Adesina, a gum and sweets seller.
“We have a look at who calls whenever KAI is coming and we all stop selling and run. They cannot stop us from trading because this is the only way we know to survive,” says Sade.
In July 2016, in an attempt to escape the tight leash of the law, a street hawker was run over by a bus, leading to widespread violence and destruction by a mob. The incident led to even tighter regulations being enforced by Lagos State governor Akinwumi Ambode who declared a fine of N90, 000 ($250) or a six-month jail term.
“Things have really gotten a lot tougher for us because you never know when the task force will detain you. We move about a lot so they do not find us and take away what little money we have,” says Adesina.
However, Lagos State says the clampdown on street hawkers is necessary as it causes traffic jams and puts their own lives at risk.
Yakubu Mohammed, 25, sells watches on a busy intersection in Ladipo.
“Competition is tough here because there are so many of us. I make about N35,000 ($100) a month which I use to feed my wife and child,” he says.
According to the African Development Bank (AfDB), over 55% of Africa’s GDP comes from the informal sector, accounting for about 80% of the labour force. Many of those are street vendors like Mohammed who have traded in everything from windscreen wipers to mobile phone chargers in the past year alone.
“You sell what you can get your hands on. Sometimes there is a lot of supply of certain types of products and they are easy to get your hands on so you get them and start selling,” says Mohammed.
That supply is driven by an insatiable demand by customers who prefer the convenience of picking up items on their way to their various destinations.
<div id="attachment_35891" style="width: 1034px" class="wp-caption aligncenter"><img aria-describedby="caption-attachment-35891" decoding="async" loading="lazy" class="wp-image-35891 size-large" src="https://www.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/04/hawker-1024x685.jpg" alt="" width="1024" height="685" srcset="https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/04/hawker-1024x685.jpg 1024w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/04/hawker-300x201.jpg 300w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/04/hawker-600x401.jpg 600w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/04/hawker-768x514.jpg 768w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/04/hawker.jpg 1725w" sizes="(max-width: 1024px) 100vw, 1024px" />A street vendor hawks tubers of yam in a wheel-barrow in Ketu district of Lagos. Photograph supplied.</div>
The constant ruckus between government enforcement agencies and street hawkers has led to a debate about tighter regulation of the informal sector in Nigeria.
<a href="http://www.forbesafrica.com/investment-guide/2012/11/01/nigeria-invest-not-invest-question/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">READ MORE: Nigeria: To Invest Or Not To Invest? That Is The Question</a>
According to a Reuters report, unemployment in Africa’s most populous economy is at 14% and climbing. Furthermore, the International Monetary Fund (IMF) claims: “By 2035, sub-Saharan Africa will have more working-age people than the rest of the world’s regions combined. This growing workforce will have to be met with jobs.”
“Unless the government gets a firm grip on these critical macro economic issues, the potential of the informal sector can never be realized. A lot of the stress of unemployment has been taken up by the informal sector who pay no taxes but contribute significantly to the country’s wealth,” says Bismarck Rewane, CEO of Financial Derivatives Company in Lagos.
According to the IMF report, most entrepreneurs in the informal sector reported doing what they were doing out of necessity and given the chance would rather work in the formal sector.
Bashiru Amusha dreamed of becoming a doctor but his parents could not afford to send him to school. He now owns a kiosk selling airtime vouchers in Victoria Island.
“I try to make do with what I have. I used to be a security man for a company sometime ago but things didn’t work out and I had to leave. I am hoping someone can help me get a car so I can turn it into a taxi and pay him back with interest,” he says.
In view of the economy, the informal sector presents both advantages and disadvantages. On the one hand, it is a great representation of entrepreneurship development and growth in the number of start-ups on the streets.
However, this growth is negligible when you weigh up the low productivity and the poorly-skilled workers prevalent in the informal sector.
“This is actually detrimental to the Nigerian economy because the informal sector accounts for about 50 to 65 percent of GDP and that represents reduced growth for the economy. So it is actually important to provide skilled training to improve productivity and regulate the informal sector through taxation,” says Rewane.
As Africa’s largest economy struggles to come to grips with growing unemployment rates and barriers to entry, the informal sector is the only way out for thousands of unemployed Nigerians whose only need is to somehow make ends meet.

NIGERIA-HAWKER

Loud And Lonely On The Streets – The Life of A Lagos Hawker

As 2017 gets into full swing I am reminded of the launch of CNBC Africa 10 years ago on June 1, 2007. To say time flies is an enormous understatement. I can only imagine how the Founder and Vice Chairman of the Africa Business News Group, Rakesh Wahi, must feel considering he first arrived in Africa with just a briefcase in hand 12 short years ago. Now he has a business news conglomerate with Africa’s only continent-wide business channel and Africa’s number one monthly business publication, namely and FORBES AFRICA respectively.
Back in 2007, months of rehearsals finally led to the evening of June 1 when CNBC Africa, with a flick of a switch, came to life. Then South African President Thabo Mbeki was the first interviewee on that auspicious occasion. Corporate South Africa was in full attendance. The rehearsals paid off and CNBC Africa’s first broadcast to 48 countries across sub-Saharan Africa went off without a glitch.
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The next morning, broadcast began in earnest with eight hours of African business aired around the channel’s flagship shows: Open Exchange, Power Lunch, Closing Bell and Business Tonight. Ten years ago, the Africa rising story was burning bright but aggregating business content across Africa was still an enormous challenge. CNBC Africa was pioneering territory that no one else had attempted on such a large scale. Businessmen and women across Africa were not well versed in regular, live television interviews and market commentators were still relatively media shy.
Over the last 10 years the channel has played a significant role in unlocking the continent’s business talent and today, as the depth and breadth of African capital markets rapidly improves, African business interviews are happening with regularity at across the continent.
Today, CNBC Africa is taking regional integration to the next level. It’s hard to beat a real-time pan-African conversation with Lagos, Nairobi, Kigali and South Africa all simultaneously on screen exchanging West, East and southern African business news throughout the day.
Those early days also bring to mind some of the many lighter moments that are an inevitable part of any TV channel’s launch phase. One such moment was with my then co-anchor Byron Kennedy, who now heads up corporate affairs for Vodacom. Let me try and talk you through this.
Business Tonight was in full swing, Byron and I were co-anchoring. In the early days we were heavily reliant on the shows production script which detailed which guests were expected at what time during the show. Two guests down and the live show was progressing well. The third guest was seated and, relying on my script, I confidently introduced the guest as Kevin Weeks, Head of the South African Automobile Association. At this point we were on a wide shot – the audience could see Byron, myself and the guest, who was shaking his head violently. Byron immediately jumped in and stated to both the audience and to me “No, it’s definitely not Kevin Weeks…”. But he had no idea either who the guest was and threw me a hospital pass. The director had at this point not established that we were in trouble and instead of cutting to a commercial break – the default if something goes horribly wrong – he maintained the wide camera angle which meant that the audience was not missing a beat. I had no option but to lean over slightly and asked the now bewildered gentlemen the following question “Excuse me sir, what is your name?” followed by “What are we speaking about?”
Needless to say, we have come a long way from then. I felt much better when I was told to google “BBC Taxi Driver” and realized that it happens to the best of us.
But back to the present and the fact that we are now all grown up, in business years that is. Happy 10th birthday CNBC Africa in 2017; it’s been an incredible journey and I look forward to the next decade as we continue to tell the African business story unlike anyone else.

10 Years  Of Magic And  The Odd Mishap

At Murtala Muhammed International Airport in Lagos, Nigeria, a group of angry customers are frantically trying to get answers from an Arik Air official. The scheduled 13:30PM flight to Johannesburg was cancelled just after 11AM for operational reasons, leaving hundreds of passengers stranded. Unsatisfied with the airline’s explanations, Dayo Obagun, Managing Director of Ryman’s Stationery Stores, is on the move to find an alternative flight.
“This is the third time Arik has cancelled a flight and it is especially frustrating because I have an important business meeting in South Africa this evening. Last time, I lost my ticket without reimbursement, so I know the shouting will not change anything and due to the economic challenges, all the other airlines are not operating at full capacity,” he says.
Obagun is on his way to South Africa to find new markets for his stationery business, which has seen sales drop by 50% in the past eight months. Due to the recent economic problems, he splits his time between managing his Lagos-based operations and developing new opportunities in other countries.
“The only way we can survive is by partnering with new clients. I am meeting a Dutch manufacturing company based in Johannesburg who are looking to expand to West Africa. This deal could be the difference between us staying afloat or sacking 30 people.”
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Figures from the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) suggest that Nigeria has slipped into a recession. According to the NBS, gross domestic product (GDP) contracted by 2.06% in the second quarter of 2016. The country also took a significant hit from the fall in commodity prices when global crude prices slumped. The government’s strategy to curtail the decline in oil prices was to create a fixed currency rate which, according to the BBC, created a black market for the US dollar and squeezed the economy.
Rabih Patel is the head of reserve brands for a drinks manufacturer in Lagos. Survival is also the name of the game for his organization.
“This is the worst condition I have seen in the past eight years of being in Nigeria. We had to lay off 700 expatriates in our organization. We simply cannot afford to pay their wages anymore. My good friend is going back to India with his family because of the crisis. I suspect this may last for the next two years and what business is going to survive two years of this?” says Patel.
Interestingly, Patel has seen an increase in their more prestigious drinks brands, which is up 40% from last year.
“That only makes up about three percent of my overall sales so it doesn’t make that much of a difference. However, we have seen a decline in sales of our lager and other spirits and I had to slash my marketing budget by half since the beginning of this year.”
The statistics office confirmed that annual inflation also rose to 17.1% in July, from 16.5% in June, with food inflation increasing to 15.8%.
“The crash in global oil prices has devastated the economy which is dependent on the oil sector for about 70 percent of its sales revenue”, says Frederic Mann, Chief Economist at Genesis Consulting, a financial advisory firm in Abuja.
“We have always stated that the government’s decision to artificially keep the naira at the same level made the situation worse because it restricted the flow of foreign exchange in the system, which most companies need in order to import raw materials for manufacturing,” says Mann.
According to reports, about half a million jobs have been lost in Nigeria in the past six months. The Minister of Finance, Kemi Adeosun, confirmed that the government has spent more than N400 billion ($1.3 billion) in capital expenditure this year as part of a staggering N6.06 trillion ($30 billion) budget.
“The government needs to pull resources into non-oil assets to help move the country out of recession. The government plans to borrow $10 billion from debt markets, mostly from foreign sources, but how will that money be spent to stimulate growth in the economy?” says Mann.
At least technology entrepreneurs in Nigeria had something to cheer about after a surprise visit to the country by the founder of Facebook, Mark Zuckerberg.
At the end of August, Segun Idrisu, the Founder of I-farm, an app that connects buyers and sellers of agricultural products, had an unlikely visit from Zuckerberg while the billionaire was touring Africa.
“I don’t think words can describe the excitement when we realized what was actually happening. It is definitely a confidence boost for all the techpreneurs here and to have someone like [Zuckerberg] come all the way here, it shows that this is an industry worth paying attention to,” says Idrisu.
Zuckerberg’s visit to Nigeria, which is Facebook’s biggest market in Africa with 16 million visits every month, has renewed talk to increase investment in the technology and services sector.
Renaissance Capital told CNBC Africa that the services sector, which is worth 50% of Nigeria’s GDP, shrank by 1.3% year on year in the second quarter of 2016. The services sector and agriculture are most likely to rescue Nigeria, according to Mann.
For those like Idrisu, the tech scene provides a safe haven in the current economic climate. Zuckerberg’s visit to Lagos created some optimism for young entrepreneurs who are desperately trying to find new ways to make a living. The rest of the country’s Facebook status: sad.

Nigeria’s Facebook Status: Sad

Aliko Dangote is a man revered for his remarkable achievements in business and his passion for his country. As I wait patiently in his office at Union Marble House, in the plush Lagos suburb of Ikoyi, an inscribed plaque catches my eye. Before I can read it, I hear a man’s voice.
“Nothing is impossible. That is my mantra in life. No matter what you go through, just remember, nothing is impossible for you to achieve and you will overcome it.”
Dangote, Africa’s richest man and the founder of Dangote Group, is dressed in a blue suit and purple tie. His demeanor is warm and welcoming, his gaze attentive. It is hard to believe this soft-spoken man is worth an estimated $14.4 billion, according to FORBES. Despite this wealth, the plaque in his office serves as a reminder of a day he almost lost everything. It all began with a wrong soil test.
“We were importing cement and we had an import terminal in Lagos and Port Harcourt. The government gave incentives to people who will make Nigeria self-sufficient in cement and so we decided to take advantage of the opportunity and build a cement plant. At the time, the entire production of Nigeria was less than two million tons but we decided that we were going to go ahead and build a [plant with] five million tons capacity,” says Dangote.
<div id="attachment_5094" style="width: 310px" class="wp-caption alignleft"><img aria-describedby="caption-attachment-5094" decoding="async" loading="lazy" class="size-medium wp-image-5094" src="/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/aliko-dangote-300x200.jpg" alt="" width="300" height="200" />Founder and Chief Executive of the Dangote Group Aliko Dangote gestures during an interview with Reuters in his office in Lagos, June 13, 2012. Picture taken June 13, 2012 REUTERS/Akintunde Akinleye (NIGERIA &#8211; Tags: BUSINESS) &#8211; RTR37GOU</div>
“So we brought in a contractor and we asked them to do the soil test and also the foundation test. Then they gave us the wrong soil test. Normally the northern part of Nigeria has very hard ground. But they came back and said we just needed a shallow foundation with a maximum of two meters. So the drawing and everything was done based on a two-meter foundation. As soon as we were three months into the job we realized it was more than this.”
This marked the beginning of a long battle to salvage the multi-million-dollar project. The group had hedged everything on the cement factory. In order to stay ahead of the competition, Dangote decided not to do a proper feasibility study so as to avoid attention to the new project. That decision came at a high cost.
“So now we had to go and do piling. We had to stop and change all the drawings and all of a sudden we were faced with 1,000 piles to be built and there were not enough rigs in Nigeria. So we had to order new rigs and even buy rigs for some of the contractors,” says Dangote.
To make matters worse, Dangote needed to finance the project.
“We needed to raise $480 million but the problem was 90 percent of the banks at the time had a market capital of only $20 million. In addition, there were no long-term loans, only short-term loans for about 90 days, so you could tell the challenge we faced. The project stopped, we had to change the drawings and we could not borrow too much money in the system. Borrowing short term and investing in a long-term business was so difficult.”
Another problem was infrastructure.
“We realized that we had to build a gas pipeline because the government who promised to build the pipeline in 1978 had actually not done anything, so we had to construct 92 kilometers of a gas pipeline. The water table was very bad in the area so we had to build a dam and over 100 houses because there was nothing there, so the challenges were coming one by one.”
For Dangote, failure was not an option.
“In my office, I had the project drawings on my wall but I knew that once this project fails the group is gone and that is what really kept me going. It was a major project for us because our size, compared to a project of half a billion then, was big money for us.”
Eventually, there was light at the end of the tunnel. The group received a much-needed lifeline in the form of a $479-million loan from a consortium of banks, led by the International Finance Corporation (IFC). But the storm hadn’t abated yet.
“The most challenging was when we had the cost overrun. Now we had finished the cement factory and the factory was not working and that was really when I went from black to red. I knew that we were really in trouble. But we were very adamant and we persevered. We had challenges for over a year or so and the factory was working on and off,” he says.
That was in 2003. Since then, the Dangote Group has expanded into 18 countries in sub-Saharan Africa as well as Nepal. This year, Dangote plans to take on a new challenge, the volatile oil market.
“We have been pushed into oil because we realized that we had too much cash for the type of business that we are running today, so we need to diversify. On the diversification strategy, we look at what the areas are that can actually take Nigerians to the next level and that is where we map out all the issues and the problems that we are facing as a country for lack of diversifying the economy.”
The group is building one of the largest oil refineries in the country with the potential to meet Nigeria’s requirement of 445,000 to 550,000 barrels of fuel, with spare capacity to export, according to Dangote. The project has an estimated completion date of 2018.
As we wrap up the interview, Dangote’s gaze goes back to the plaque on his table.
“It was a challenging experience and that is why I have the plaque on the table saying nothing is impossible. You need tenacity and focus in business. I have learned a lot and since that time I don’t really get scared of anything.”

“I Knew That We Were Really  In Trouble”

In the heart of Lagos, the Rose of Sharon Glorious Ministry International is home to an intimate congregation who meet every Tuesday for fellowship and prayer. They are dedicated to a common purpose, to serve God, a vision which has remained intact since its founder, Folorunsho Alakija, made a pact with God decades ago.
“I don’t think I could have got this far if I had not entered into a covenant with God. It was 25 years since I gave my life to Christ. I entered into an agreement that if he would bless me I would serve him all the days of my life,” says Alakija.
The ministry is one of many ways Alakija is keeping her promise to God. Another is through her work with the Rose of Sharon Foundation, a not-for-profit providing care, financial support and scholarships for widows and orphans. In return, God has kept his side of the bargain.
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Alakija is worth a staggering $1.73 billion according to Forbes, making her the fourth richest person in Nigeria and second richest woman in Africa behind Isabel dos Santos. She is the Vice Chair of Nigerian oil exploration company, Famfa Oil, which shares a joint partnership agreement with international giants Chevron and Petrobras. With a 60% stake of block OML 127 of the Agbami field, one of Nigeria’s largest deepwater discoveries, Famfa Oil produces approximately 250,000 barrels of crude per day, according to Alakija. Having just turned 65 in July, Alakija has a lot to be thankful for. She is blessed with a dedicated husband, four sons and grandchildren. Alakija’s feet are firmly on the ground but her journey to becoming one of Forbes’ 100 most powerful women in the world began with an encounter 36,000 feet above sea level.
“I met a friend of mine on a flight on my way to England and she asked me if I could help her partners to be able to lift crude oil from Nigeria. So I called around and set up an appointment with the petroleum minister but he discouraged me. He said are these people willing to invest in Nigeria because the government did not want to encourage more foreigners to come and lift its crude. I asked my friend who said they didn’t want to invest in Nigeria and that was the end of that,” says Alakija.
With that, the new oil opportunity came to an end. But her dogged determination transformed this negative conclusion into one of the most renowned success stories to come from Africa. This tenacity began at an early age.
“I come from a Muslim background and it was a polygamous lifestyle. My father had eight wives and 52 children. All the wives had to cooperate with each other. To them that was how life was, they cooperated with one another, they quarrelled and made up again, most of us were living under one roof in private bedrooms, I think about four floors of a building, in the heart of Lagos Island,” says Alakija.
Born into a family of traders, Alakija cut her teeth in the textiles trade while still a child.
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“My siblings and I used to help my mum in the store and that is where we learned a lot about textiles, textures, colors, patterns and merchandizing. That is where I learned all the practical steps that I later on applied to my fashion business.”
The fashion business came after her stint in the corporate banking world. After qualifying as a secretary in Britain, a place where she also went to school from the age of seven to eleven, Alakija worked as an executive secretary with the bank, Sijuade Enterprises, in Lagos for a year and a half before joining the International Merchant Bank of Nigeria.
“I joined them as a secretary and I was there for about 12 years. I was promoted to other departments of the bank, including heading the corporate affairs department. From there I moved into proper banking, working in the treasury department. I loved it because I was trading with the bank’s money to make money for the bank. Later on, the bank was expanding and they started putting extra cogs between the wheels to ensure that people did not get promoted too fast to get to top positions within the bank. So I asked myself, ‘how long will it take me to get from a treasury officer to a general manager?’” says Alakija.
She quit her job and decided to study fashion design. She enrolled in the American College in London as well as the Central School of Fashion where she obtained a distinction. Immediately after that, Supreme Stitches was born and Alakija became renowned for her haute couture range, which was worn by women around the world.
Alakija says divine intervention persuaded her to rename her fashion business.
“I rebranded to Rose of Sharon House of Fashion because God gave me a revelation that I needed to change the name. It was a revelation initially given through a pastor but I decided I was not going to change it until I heard from God myself. I had a dream a year after the prophecy was given and I saw the new name on the body of my van in the dream and I changed it overnight,” says Alakija.
Then came her foray into printing. Alakija established the Rose of Sharon Prints and Promotions, as well as Digital Reality Prints.
“I wanted a new challenge; I was getting bored of the fashion business… the [printing] business did well for the first couple of years before it got into trouble,” she says.
The Lagos State government clamped down on the printing business because billboards were clogging up the skyline. Sales for her fledgling business plummeted.
“At some point when I went abroad, I saw some printing machines and realized that those were the similar kind of machines I had been shown in [a] dream but those were for offset. I went into the wrong type of printing out of disobedience and ignorance. I misunderstood and I was excited with the large format machines so I didn’t do too much homework into trying to find out more about the pictures that I saw in my dream. So I eventually got into the offset printing five years ago. And it’s been a success. We started out with 30 people and now we have about 100 employees,” says Alakija.
There was a smooth transition from the fashion business into mass-produced t-shirts. Demand for monograms, screen-printing and picture transfers on t-shirts increased. The company set up four departments, including a souvenirs department where they imported souvenirs and gift items from China. Ever the entrepreneur, Alakija was still on the lookout for the next big thing.
Alakija’s encounter with her friend on the flight to England was fortuitous. After her friend decided not to invest in the Nigerian oil industry, Alakija decided to make use of her new contact, Maryam Babaginda. Maryam was the wife of Ibrahim Babaginda, the former president of Nigeria under military rule. As a customer of Supreme Stitches, Maryam was able to secure another appointment for Alakija with the petroleum minister, Jubril Aminu.
“I went back and told the petroleum minister that I would like to render other services, like catering for the oil industry. He said there were already so many caterers on board, various ships on the high seas, and as a result, there were no opportunities available.”
Although disappointed, Alakija did not give up. She decided to do some more homework. After consultations with a close relative who worked for the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC), she was advised to offer transportation services for the petroleum industry. It took a long time to get another meeting with Aminu.
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“I finally got another opportunity and I wrote an official letter saying I would like to offer transportation services to the oil sector. The minister’s feedback was he didn’t think it was a good idea because the government would soon be doing away with the trucks that were being used to transport crude oil and replace them with a lot more pipelines instead. So I said ‘what am I going to ask for now?’”
“He said ‘why don’t you think of exploration?’. He said the government wants to put the resources of its land in the hands of its nationals, because it feels that it is about time that Nigerians begin to exploit its own resources rather than let multinationals continue to take away our wealth. I had given up at this point. I thought he was being sarcastic and he didn’t want to help all along,” she says.
Alakija cried all night. It felt as if a major door had been closed. After seeking consolation from her husband, Alakija went on to inform Maryam of the outcome of the meeting.
“I told her that it was bad news and that the petroleum minister wants to give me a heart attack. I went back to do a lot more homework and consulted with a friend of my husband who was already in the oil business. At the end of the research, I decided to not give up and officially apply for an opportunity to get an oil block,” says Alakija.
Before submitting her letter, Alakija had already found her technical partners and it was now a waiting game. To her surprise, the oil minister was replaced and Alakija had to restart the whole process again. She kept pushing. Everything seemed to be going according to plan when the second oil minister was also replaced.
“At this stage I still wasn’t ready to give up. The third minister finally wrote me a letter to tell me my application was receiving attention after two years. I got the letter and I cried my eyes out in frustration again at the snail’s pace progress the application was making,” says Alakija.
Swaying from one military coup to another, the Nigerian political climate was volatile during the 1990s. While on holiday in the Philippines, news broke about yet another change in the Nigerian regime. Alakija’s oil application was still being reviewed.
“I raced back to Nigeria to find that the current administration had already done the oil block allocations before they left power and my license was waiting for me. It took three years of not taking no for an answer and going back each time the door was shut in my face,” says Alakija.
She finally had her oil block, but the battle was far from over.
“When I was making the application I listed several blocks. I didn’t want to take a chance on someone else taking my block. So I applied for several blocks and the one I was allocated was the one nobody wanted because it was deep offshore and nobody was exploring deep offshore because it was too expensive to explore and there was no technology around to explore that initial depth of 5,000 feet at that time,” says Alakija.
At first, it seemed Alakija had drawn the short straw. She did not have the technology, expertise and money to start the process of exploration. Alakija, with support from her husband, had to use their life savings to secure the license or face losing it after the government threatened to terminate the agreement if full payment was not made. It took Alakija an additional three years to find new partners after her initial partners pulled out. After years of knocking on countless doors, their persistence paid off.
“Texaco was already in Nigeria and looking to expand their business. They went to the Department of Petroleum Resources (DPR), who told them that Famfa Oil was looking for technical partners. So they linked us up. The license we had was not worth more than the paper it was written on until they came in,” says Alakija.
Five years later, Chevron bought Texaco, including the partnership with Famfa Oil.
After receiving a signature bonus, out of which Alakija was able to pay the balance of the license to the government, Alakija started working with her new partners. Chevron set up an office four months after signing the partnership contract, with Alakija holding on to 60% of the shareholding of the oil block and Chevron taking 40%. Chevron later sold an 8% stake to Petrobras in exchange for their deep offshore technical expertise.
“You can find oil, but if what you have spent is more than the quantity of oil available within the block to make your money back in multiples, then it was not worth carrying on and you cut your losses. You could even have a dry hole after spending millions to explore. So when we found oil in commercial quantities, they said they had to announce it to their shareholders and it has been a battle ever since.”
The announcement of the major find in Alakija’s oil block by Chevron attracted the attention of the Nigerian government who had initially assumed that the oil block was one of the worst due to its location. The government snatched an initial 40% stake from Alakija, followed by another 10% stake, leaving her with a meagre 10% stake.
“We felt like it was unfair. We had taken the sole risk and invested everything we had in the business. It had become a family business. We spent six years as a family to ensure this worked out and now that it was bearing fruit, they just stepped in and took away everything we had struggled and worked extremely hard for. I said to myself, ‘Folorunsho Alakija does not give up, my husband does not give up and my children do not give up.’”
Most of her advisers believed it would be impossible to win a legal battle against the government, which, at the time, was notorious for its corruption. Alakija ignored their advice and took the government to court. For her, the case was simple, Nigeria has a constitution and nobody, including the government, is above that constitution. After 12 years of intense legal battle, the courts returned the 60% shareholding back to the family.
“It was bittersweet. There were a lot of sleepless nights and battles. Suddenly we became the plague, friends stopped picking up our calls and people were asking why we could not be content with 10 percent. My husband was a rock, to myself and the family, during that time and I could not have done it without him,” says Alakija.
Dolapo Oni, Head of Energy Research at Ecobank, praises Alakija’s courage.
“Alakija has run a very successful business in Famfa Oil. She was one of the first women in the oil business and her battle with the federal government shows a great deal of tenacity. After they took away her block, she successfully won it back. She was also one of the first women to partner with a joint venture partner, Chevron, which has been very successful,” he says.
Oni, however, feels the oil company needs to branch out.
“I think they are risk averse. Having been as successful as they are, they do not want to explore other opportunities. I personally feel like you have to increase your reserve base, you have to explore other assets and Famfa has traditionally not diversified their holdings in other fields, which I believe could be very profitable for the business as well.”
For now, Alakija seems content. She met her husband, Modupe, a year after she returned to Nigeria from England and they have been married for over 40 years. These days, Alakija spends her time as a proud grandmother and an author, having penned several books, including her autobiography Growing With The Hand That Gives The Rose, The University of Marriage and The Cry of Widows and Orphans.
As Alakija stands amid the melodic songs of praise in her Tuesday fellowship, she is at peace. Interfere with her business, however, and it’s war.

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A Head For Business And  Fists For A Fight

Standing in a long queue of pedestrians in Surulere on the mainland of Lagos, Nigeria, Austin Somefun is waiting for an okada (motorcycle taxi). He is on his way to view a new flat for his family, which currently stands at five children and two wives.
“My second wife just had her third child and so we need a bigger space. I have been looking at properties all week but so far, I have not found the right size for my family,” says Somefun.
He is part of the growing population in a country, which according to Reuters, will increase from 188 million to 300 million people by 2030.
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“Population explosion definitely creates a demand for residential property. The Lagos State commissioner for budget and planning estimates that Lagos alone needs to spend $50 billion in the next couple of years to keep up with the 23 million residents in the state and a significant amount of that budget will go towards housing,” says Steven Brown, an economist working with Britain-based Integra Consulting.
According to the Real Estate Developer’s Agency of Nigeria, the country is lacking about 17 million houses with about 60-70% living in slums and informal settlements. The Centre for Affordable Housing and Finance in Africa, estimates that 700,000 more homes are needed each year to keep pace with the population explosion.
Kennedy Okonkwo is founder of Nedcomoaks, an indigenous real estate company vying for this growing market. The company focuses on Nigeria’s middle class who, according to Okonkwo, is underserved. Okonkwo had a brief stint in the IT and human resources sector before a missed opportunity changed his life.
“I was working as a strategic adviser for a company and my part time job in real estate had a deal that was worth N18 million ($90,000). The deal meant I was going to provide accommodation for expatriates and the company issuing the contract was waiting for me to come and see them but I was busy doing a strategy session so I lost the deal to a competitor. I said to myself it’s time to focus on the property business and I resigned from the job,” says Okonkwo.
His love affair with bricks and mortar began when he brokered his first deal as an estate agent worth N260,000 ($1,300). Okonkwo started from scratch; scraping together money for construction while selling Hawes &amp; Curtis shirts to tide him over.
“The landowners had signed over the land for 30 years and most of the families did not have money to build on the land and time was running out. So I approached them and got the land on leases. I got about 22 of them and started building four units of room and parlour self contains and doing resettlement schemes,” says Okonkwo.
Things were looking up for Okonkwo until the global recession hit him in 2008. Most of his clients who invested in the properties could no longer afford the monthly repayments and the banks clamped down on all credit to business. Luckily for Okonkwo, he secured a loan of N100,000,000 ($500,000), which added to the company’s working capital and proved a lifeline.
“Initially, we would look for money to develop one property and once we sold that, we would build three more properties because we would market and get other people to buy more. Once we got the loan from the bank, we were able to expand very rapidly.”
Part of the Nedcomoaks property portfolio is a 92-unit construction of three-bedroom terraces and a new build of 28 units of four-bedroom houses with average prices for his developments at N25 million ($125,000).
Similar to Brown, Okonkwo believes there are massive opportunities within the property market in Nigeria. The Nigerian property sector is valued at $39 billion according to a recent report by CBO Capital, an investment advisory firm based in Lagos.
“I went into the property business because I felt there is a real need for it. For everybody, when you look at your needs, it’s probably food first and then you think of shelter. So there is no way anybody that is providing shelter will get it wrong. I think there are enormous opportunities to tap into in the Nigerian property market today and the reputation of the developer matters a whole lot,” says Okonkwo.
The industry still has a long way to go to satisfy the growing demand. Like everywhere in Nigeria, the foreign exchange (FX) restrictions in the country have hit the property market.
“In the operational aspect of construction, it has a tendency to drive up the cost of the construction because most of the finishing materials are imported and so the restrictions of FX make it difficult to import these goods which drives up the price. On the other hand, a property that was selling at $150,000 can now go for $100,000 if the person has FX, so for these people, there is a higher advantage,” says Okonkwo.
As Africa’s largest economy continues to grow, Okonkwo is gearing up to be the go-to property developer for the growing middle class, one home at a time.

The Miss That Led To  A bullseye

Once an epitome of slums, chaos and erosion, Lagos is now home to a new breed of entrepreneurs, creative netizens and socially responsive leaders. They’re dealing with the demons of development, placing their bets on the commercial magic of the city and fomenting plans to benefit from the spasms of a city in search of its soul and a smart future.
With roughly 20 million people, Lagos is Africa’s most congested city, and the gateway to the continent’s biggest economy. Arguably one of the reasons why Nigeria is Africa’s most populous nation, the city and its environs represent the most economically significant aspects of life in Nigeria. According to the UN, Lagos will be the world’s third largest city by 2025, with 25 million people, and will need to provide shelter for 77 million by the end of the century.
Its excruciating population, coastal location and complex political economy, makes it a perfect melting pot, a bazaar of pain and pleasure, an investor’s haven. For a city which welcomes a new arrival almost every minute, Lagos is literally a pressure cooker, an addiction, a habitat for struggling software gurus and literary Lilliputians, a testament to human resilience and surely, its proclivity for concocting fame, fortune, disaster, adventure and adversity.
“Lagos is without a doubt the engine of Nigeria’s economy,” says Niji Adelagun, CEO of IQ Systems Solutions. “The place has always been driven and defined by its constantly evolving demographics, ambition and the quest for identity.”
Lagos is largely responsible for the nation’s burgeoning “lifestyle economy”: the proliferation of leisure and entertainment establishments, art galleries, music dens like Fela Kuti’s Africa Shrine, and Freedom Park, once a colonial jail house and now an open space where art and literary cognoscenti converge for shows, recitals and festivals.
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The gods of the marketplace also like Lagos. Its fabled open-air markets (in Badagry, Balogun, Oke-Arin, Oyingbo and Mile 12) continue to receive bargain hunters from as far as Bouaké in Côte d’Ivoire, Bobo-Dioulasso in Burkina Faso, Banjul in Gambia and Bamako in Mali. Telecoms operators Airtel, Etisalat, Glo, MTN and new entrant NTel all have their head offices in Lagos. The Lagos-based Nigerian Stock Exchange and the activities of financial institutions fuel commerce, manufacturing and job security nationwide.
Among the array of enterprising citizens in this space are Olaide Agboola and Obinna Onunkwo, two ex-bankers who quit their comfy jobs a few years ago to set up Purple Capital Partners Ltd, an investment, private equity and real estate firm. Still in their thirties, they are by no means the wealthiest or most prominent players in their field. They however represent an emerging class of risk taking, empire-building citizenry; a potent can-do spirit so abundant in Lagos.
The Purple Capital duo are helping to reshape the state’s retail, entertainment and lifestyle sectors: financing and developing a boutique hotel, bespoke residential apartments and malls across the state, in the process creating new jobs and rejuvenating the state’s agro-allied, construction, information technology, out-of-home advertising and logistics industries.
Partnering with Stanbic IBTC Bank and AXA Mansard Investments, their flagship project, the Maryland Mall, located in the Maryland district of the state will open later this year. Built at a cost of about $25 million, the development will possibly be the largest investment in retail infrastructure in Lagos by a private firm after Nigeria’s 2015 general elections.
Maryland Mall will have the largest outdoor LED screen in West Africa, cementing the mall’s status as a landmark with a remarkable outdoor character and atmosphere in tandem with world-renowned locations like Times Square in New York, and Piccadilly Circus in London.
Official government data shows that Nigeria attracted over $1.3 billion in investments into its formal retail sector over the last four years. Yet modern malls represent only around 3% of Nigeria’s retail space. As Lagosians welcome the stress-free shopping experience that modern markets represent, affinity to traditional African open-air markets, a cultural inertia to the glitz and glamour of shopping malls, remains strong.
Private, public sector partnerships, improved public administration of state resources and efficient tax administration has given Lagos a healthy balance sheet. It generates up to 67% of its income from within, with monthly revenues growing from $4 million in 1999 to more than $100 million presently.
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The state has the best record for internally generated revenue and is also the largest debtor among Nigeria’s 36 states, with total domestic obligations of N268 billion (about $1.3 billion) as at December 2014, according to the Debt Management Office.
Citizens benefit from this deft management of public resources. A better lit, neater, better managed, safer and friendlier Lagos is emerging. Crime in Lagos in 2015 dropped with police recording 220 murders, 44 armed robbery and 25 kidnap cases. In 2012, state authorities set up Lagos Traffic Radio, Nigeria’s first radio station dedicated to traffic management.
The pervading poverty in the land however competes for space with an urban jungle of mansions, private jets, yacht clubs and an ever-growing presence of sleek automobiles. This contrasting visage is mostly visible in the Ikoyi, Victoria Island and Lekki peninsula areas of the state.
In the foreseeable future, new urban landscapes will rise out of the bowels of the old city. A new airport, petroleum refinery and port will bring life to the Lekki Free Trade Zone in the east of Lagos. And the Eko Atlantic Economic City, a Dubai-style development on land reclaimed from the Atlantic Ocean, will become a reality – concrete evidence of the state’s mega-city status.
With a new marina and 10 million square meters of prime real estate, Lagos’ position as West Africa’s financial capital is secure.
<h1>Barcelona to kick off in lagos?</h1>
In a bid to jumpstart local innovation and boost the productivity of citizens, the Lagos State authorities plan to provide loans to artisans, young entrepreneurs and start-ups via an Employment Trust Fund worth N25 billion (about $125 million).
The city hosted its first marathon in 30 years last February and soon Spain’s Barcelona FC will open a youth academy in Lagos.
“These developments showcase a paradigm shift in the governance of the state. Investors and the entire world are taking note,” says Steve Ayorinde, the state’s Commissioner for Information and Strategy.  He says Lagos State governor Akinwunmi Ambode’s priorities include “expanding the waterways to move more people, working on completing the light rail projects, and engaging the youths through the arts, entertainment, tourism and sports”.
“Lagos has a vibe, you just can’t put your finger on it, imagine I’m still in heavy traffic at 10PM!” says Peju Adebajo, CEO of Lafarge Africa’s cement subsidiary. “It’s everything from the attitude of Lagosians to entrepreneurs, to the unpredictability of the place and the succession of improving governance also means that more and more goods and services are attracted to Lagos despite the high cost, so housing and infrastructure has to develop around it.”
LafargeHolcim, parent company of Lafarge Africa, is working with government agencies and real estate developers to roll out mass housing schemes on the outskirts of Lagos, which technically are in nearby Ogun State. The authorities in Ogun State are keen to leverage their proximity to Lagos, using the New York-New Jersey model as its reference.
“We can’t continue to do mass housing on a bespoke basis anymore, we need to build modern, structured communities; that’s the only way we will begin to plug the huge gap in the housing sector,” says Adebajo.

Where Commerce,  Concrete  And  Culture Collide

Its 7:30AM in Victoria Island, Lagos, and across the road from Oniru, a suburb in the city, cars are piled up in front of the Total petrol station. There is also a separate line of about 100 people with empty yellow containers waiting to be filled. Toke Ogunlesi, founder of GQ Shoes, a shoe manufacturing business is number 30 in the queue of irritated car drivers – some of whom slept in their cars.
“This is really terrible, I have been queuing for the past three hours even though I arrived very early this morning. Yesterday, I couldn’t get any fuel and so I decided I would leave the house early today but unfortunately that plan did not work,” says Ogunlesi.
Business has slowed down significantly for his fledgling business, which, like many businesses in Africa’s largest economy, is hampered by severe power cuts. Nigeria has a diversified economy, however, the country’s monetary policy is heavily dependent on oil. The finance minister, Kemi Adeosun, in an interview with Reuters, said the country is expected to post budget deficits for the next two to three years. Reuters puts the 2016 deficit at 2.2 trillion naira (around $11 billion).
“Firstly, Nigeria has a revenue challenge, oil prices are low and this is leading to production challenges. We lost Forcados which is a major terminal for exporting crude oil, that means about 250,000 barrels have been shut down and cannot leave the country at the moment, so we are not pushing as much production as we used to. This means the little revenue we are making right now has to be dispersed to finance imports for various things, like foreign exchange (FX) for imports and refineries, normal FX for fuel imports and other production costs,” says Dolapo Oni, an analyst with Ecobank.
“On the other side, the industry also has a regulated pricing structure so marketers are not able to sell at whatever prices they need to sell to recoup whatever costs they incur in the process of buying and selling the petroleum products. So, as a result, most of them are either not ready to sell and keep that loss or, if they had the opportunity, they will sell at a much higher price so that they can recoup the costs that they are facing. They are also faced with higher cost of FX because most of them have to buy their FX from the parallel markets among the various other charges that they face when they also try and load at the depot.”
The restriction of foreign currency in the country has also had a negative impact on the oil market, which is a dollar-denominated business. According to the Shippers Association of Lagos State, the forex restriction has led to 50% of Nigerian bound cargos being diverted to Cotonou, Benin. But there may be help on the horizon.
“I think the situation is gradually easing because we now have FX supply coming from oil and gas companies. The upstream guys, like Shell, Total and ENI, have been tasked to provide about $200 million to some of the fuel marketers to assist them to import more products into the country. This is not a sustainable solution because you are asking these guys to also part with FX, which they also need to invest in other parts of the world where they have operations. They cannot continue to always give us $200 million every month or every year and also I do not know what we have given up as a country to be able to receive that help because there has been a trade-off somewhere,” says Oni.
The current dilemma has however presented an unlikely opportunity for one entrepreneur. Fueledup is an app that has been created by 24-year-old Nigerian developer, Subomi Owo-Odusi. The app is an on demand delivery service, where customers sign up to request fuel.
“It is more of creating a convenience that is necessary. It picks your location naturally with Google location services. There is a request for how much you want and the delivery time. We have three delivery times; there is priority, expectant and flexible. Flexible is within three hours, expectant is within 30 minutes and two hours, and priority is within 30 minutes and an hour. So, take for instance a situation where you wake up and you go to take a shower, by the time you finish getting ready in an hour you realize that your car is already filled up,” says Odusi.
The app is scheduled to be launched in May and has already received a positive response.
“We are speaking to private depots that we can get our supply from. Eventually we want this to become a lifestyle where people ask ‘have you got fueled up today?’”
The company is looking to expand rapidly outside Lagos to other major cities in the country.
A critical success factor for start-ups like Odusi’s in this climate is the cost of goods and services.
“Inflationary measures are rising. Prices have been increasing steadily. It got to 11.3 percent last year and the figure is due to come out this week and I am already hearing that it will be around 12.8 percent, which is significantly higher than the last inflation figure… It is the lesson of the crisis, when you don’t save or put money aside for a rainy day, when the rainy day comes you will be wet,” says Oni.
He believes the government should push for deregulation of the industry to prevent this crisis from repeating itself.
“In a market that is regulated, it is very easy for these conditions to happen because once we have that common pricing structure people tend to come strongly under unions. Once we deregulate this, there is no tendency that the union will tell someone to shut down their station because they know that once others are all not selling, they will make more money if they sell. So, unions go weaker in markets that are competitive.”
The influx of foreign currency is expected to ease the current fuel crisis gripping the Nigerian economy, however, the economic hardships are far from over. The decline in oil prices and corresponding decline in revenues, has had a knock-on effect on the oil sector and other ancillary markets.
“The only way out is that we should allow the market to decide where the naira should be priced at and, as a result, where the products within the economy should also be priced to allow for a competitive business environment,” says Oni.

Fuel Shortage  In The   Land Of Oil

That Africa is the new mecca of international luxury brands is constantly reiterated by the number of new players in the market. The development of home-grown luxury brands is also more topical. And with these brands have come experts, such as Lola Emeruwa, who has worked for big global brands such as Louis Vuitton, Marc Jacobs, Stella McCartney and Net a Porter in mega cities like London, Milan, Paris, New York, and more recently, with Ermenegildo Zegna in Lagos. As the founder of Le Retail Operations Management, a luxury retail consultancy firm in Nigeria, Emeruwa’s work spans retail operation analysis to buying and merchandizing. One of her key projects is a co-venture with WISH publishing to create a new retail avenue for high-end hotels in Nigeria. We caught up with Emeruwa mid-2015 to discuss the growing luxury market in Africa’s biggest economy.
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Given your extensive background in international luxury fashion, what challenges does the African market face in this regard? How receptive are consumers to luxury in Africa?
Consumers are certainly very receptive to luxury in Nigeria and it is reflective of what I like to refer to as ‘The Nigerian Dream – the pursuit of finer things’. In a superficial assessment, you can see this desire fully expressed in a city like Lagos – in the abundance of luxury cars, upsurge of upmarket hotels, increased development of luxury retail spaces and surprisingly frequent conversations about the charter of private jets.
This is a reflection of great improvements in sub-Saharan Africa’s economic performance since the turn of the century, which grew at an average rate of 5.5% per annum in real terms between 2000 to 2012, compared to 2.54% per annum during the previous 13-year period.
Significantly, this growth has been despite factors such as limited infrastructure, little investment and lack of formal organization. Whilst on other continents this would pose as challenges, these are in fact just accepted here as the norm. In terms of the luxury retail industry, I believe the challenges are the same as in Europe or America: implementing effective marketing, new customer acquisition, logistical problems etc. However, for those trying to enter the Nigerian market and who are used to a more structured means of operating, it will be advisable to partner with a local expert.
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What is your company’s vision for the Nigerian market?
Our vision is to develop a productive synergy for international brands looking to enter the Nigerian market. In addition, Le Retail intends to be the reference point for support and integration of local brands into the global market by ensuring international industry practice standards are met.
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What areas will improve the viability of the Nigerian luxury retail space?
In the long term, improvement of infrastructure and power supply and in the short term, more sector deregulation of restrictions which would encourage capital inflow and increased investment.
Whilst infrastructure and energy projects are already ongoing (our election promise), I believe establishing a more formalized industry will give investors the confidence to diversify into the Nigerian luxury retail space.

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Private Jets, Hip Hotels And Deep Pockets

In a continent where music is the lifeblood of so many cultures, a generation of musicians and creatives from Lagos to Cape Town are at risk of falling by the wayside as more and more of them are robbed of their income by the greatest scourge to their industries – piracy.
According to a recent report from the International Federation of the Phonographic Industry (IFPI), legitimate content accounts for less than 10% of the music market in many African nations. Estimates put the proportion of Kenyan pirated music at 80% nationally. Growing up in Lagos, I have memories of sitting in traffic where CDs yet to hit the shops in Europe, let alone Nigeria, were offered through my car window.
Taking Lagos’ infamous Alaba Market as a microcosm of the broader situation, piracy dominates the distribution network, flooding the market with knock-off Nollywood films and bootlegged beats. For the original creators, while they may enjoy popularity, the financial rewards for their efforts range from minimal to non-existent.
This situation is replicated across the continent. In Malawi, artistes like Thocco Katimb end up distributing and selling their own music because intellectual property rights are not robust enough, and the middle men can’t be trusted to not leak CDs to be replicated. The situation in Malawi is complicated further by the government’s stance against musicians selling their music without the hologram copyright sticker as stipulated by the 1989 copyright act.
As a result, life for many creatives across Africa is unstable. Fellow musicians tend to work primarily for the love of their craft; the joy of their art is almost reward enough. But without suitable financial recompense, many talented Africans are being denied the chance to pursue their aspirations.
If the industry climate further dissuades young African talent from producing high-quality art, we as a continent risk losing an entire generation’s worth of cultural output. Who will be the next Fela Kuti? Where will the new 2face Idibia appear? How can Ghana see another Sarkodie, or Uganda another Chameleone, if the industry does not suitably reward those artistes whose music is in demand?
All is not lost, however, and there are areas that must be explored to combat content piracy.
Effective intellectual property protection is the most important step that national governments can take in countries like Nigeria, Malawi, and other flourishing cultural hotspots. In just the same way as encouraging business growth or attracting foreign investment, legal frameworks are central to ensuring that legitimate enterprise thrives.
A hologram on a CD is not enough; there must be suitable measures in place and the will to enforce them. Kenya destroyed over five million pirated items in 2013 and the Kenya Copyright Board has since begun actively monitoring illegal downloads. Other nations would do well to follow this example.
Beyond a crackdown, however, a progressive long-term solution may involve bringing content pirates into the legitimate system so as to better regulate their activity.
Returning to the example of Alaba Market, since 2008, the Nigerian government has been offering traders there the opportunity to sell pirated content legally in return for a registration fee. Legitimizing these circulation channels means artistes and record labels have begun signing distribution deals with established pirating outfits in an effort to recoup at least some earnings from their own intellectual property. While the legal environment catches up with reality, exploring ways to bring these traders into the fold may be a realistic way forward.
Technology also offers solutions, providing an alternate revenue stream for struggling artistes. Kenya’s Mdundo.com, a digital platform enabling music distribution without a recording label, has been touted as a potential saviour. For $1, customers can download five tracks via a code they receive on a scratch card.
Piracy in Africa is a significant threat not just to the creative industries but to society too, with much of the profit funding organized crime. From the greats of old like King Sunny Ade, Manu Dibango and Ali Farka Toure to the new kids on the block, African music has long had an important place on the global scene. The cold, rational argument for greater intellectual property protection is certainly needed, but a more emotional appeal to the will of all Africans to nurture and encourage our continent’s brightest talents is compelling. Both must be made with equal energy if we are to keep those lights burning.

DJ-Cuppi-etch

‘Who Will Be  The Next Fela Kuti?’

There is a rowdy crowd at one of Lagos’ busiest commercial centers – the Idumota market on Lagos Island. High pitched hawkers shove their goods at customers, motorists struggle for space on the narrow roads, and hundreds of stalls, with music blaring, lay out their merchandise. Today’s hustle is no different from any other and no one knows this better than Paul Orajiaka, the entrepreneur who has spent years in this hub.
From running a little store out of a dilapidated building in the market, to owning a colossal outlet within its vicinity, Orajiaka is no stranger to the nooks and crannies of his business address.
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Orajiaka’s company, Auldon Limited, manufactures African-themed toys which promote the continent’s cultural heritage to children. The company recently launched the Unity Girl Dolls Project, with multi-cultural dolls in different Nigerian traditional attire. The dolls can be found in countries including Nigeria, Ghana, South Africa, Kenya and some parts of Europe.
Auldon Limited was founded 17 years ago with less than $100. As a determined young man, Orajiaka’s dreams were shattered when he was repeatedly denied an American visa after finishing high school in Benin City. He wanted to study business management in the United States to market his father’s business. Orajiaka’s father was a renowned African carver and staunch entrepreneur in Warri. Orajiaka, and his siblings, helped with the carving work but Orajiaka wanted to take his father’s craft to a more structured market.
“I was about 16 years old. I was denied a visa at my umpteenth attempt primarily because of my age. I had frequented Lagos to follow up with the American embassy at each application stage. I decided to remain in Lagos, where my sister also lived, after my ambitions to go to the States didn’t work out. I didn’t want to be mocked by my friends back in my hometown. I had no idea what my next move was going to be,” says Orajiaka.
He decided to work at the Idumota market.
His brother-in-law was an importer who traded in a large variety of merchandise. Orajiaka helped his in-law and was impressed by the large amount of money the business made.
“I was learning a lot about the business environment and couldn’t believe the volumes of goods we were pushing into the market. The returns were fascinating and I soon began to get excited about my new activity.”
Orajiaka proved a valuable resource to his in-law’s business and was generously rewarded. The money he was earning made up for his previous disappointments, but Orajiaka was soon advised to return to school.
“While working for my in-law, I enrolled as an accounting student at the University of Lagos after which I proceeded to get a Master’s in Business Administration from Lagos Business School. This reinforced my gusto for the business world now that I had my professional qualifications. I decided to start thinking of my business seriously.”
While seeking new markets to supply merchandise to, in highbrow areas of Lagos, he visited a new store. He admired the toy section and was fascinated by the range and variety on the shelves.
On his next visit, he noticed that the section was almost empty and immediately asked the store manager if they needed new supplies. After getting the green light from the manager, Orajiaka scouted the length and breadth of the Idumota market for a toy stockist. The toys he found were a lot cheaper than those in the fancier stores.
“I was going to make huge margins on this product if I succeeded in getting the manager to place an order. I delivered the samples at a 300 percent markup price. The store manager ordered a few dozen immediately. I never expected this. I approached my in-law… to purchase a bigger order from the supplier for the required number of samples. This is where it all started. Today, a humble beginning which started as a small venture is a leading company, importing and supplying a diverse range of educational toys to both retailers and wholesalers in Nigeria,” he says.
“We started out with a capital base of about $30 now have a turnover of well over $7 million as at last year.”
The dolls’ visibility has grown in leaps and bounds over the years. Social responsibility is an area the company has also focused on with the Unity Girl Doll Project.
“I was not happy that most of the toys sold in Nigeria didn’t promote any cultural relevance. I wanted to promote the dark-skinned and African-featured girls and women as beautiful and their culture as diverse and admirable.”
One of the challenges Orajiaka faced was a lack of support from financial institutions in Nigeria. A school renovation program was part of the tasks that accompanied the project.
The Unity Girl Doll Project is a collection of 14-inch dolls that represent Nigeria’s three major tribes – Hausa, Ibo and Yoruba – with the aim of promoting the country’s cultural diversity and relevance to the younger generation. The dolls also have booklets outlining details of the culture, languages and backgrounds of the three main tribes.
With the dolls available in leading retail outlets across Nigeria, Orajiaka has proved that business can be child’s play.

This Business Is Child’s Play

Ufuoma Ekpecham left Lagos for London eight years ago with her suitcases, two kids and a heavy heart. She had to leave; she needed a change: the heartache following her parents’ death, three months within each other, was too much to handle. She had to divert her mind, and quickly.
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She always had a flair for fashion – she had previously been “making some good money” designing clothes for friends and family, but not as a full-time professional.
Thanks to a supportive husband, who said “go back to school, learn it properly”, when the opportunity presented itself, she left Lagos to take up a degree in fashion design in London.
Her husband stayed on in Nigeria, and Ekpecham dove into her studies, managing the home and looking after the children on her own “minus the luxury of nannies or drivers”.
It was tough, but today, the 42-year-old is the London-based creative director of her clothing brand Josh &amp; Nicol, named after her children.
Recently in Johannesburg for the Mercedes-Benz Fashion Week Africa, showcasing her spring summer 2015 collection, Ekpecham says she is in a happy space, stronger and independent, just like the motif she uses throughout her new fashion line.
Her Popidia collection for the show was a tribute to Queen Idia of Benin, the only West African warrior queen from the Niger Delta.
“She epitomizes the African woman, strong and dependable,” says Ekpecham, who returned to her roots for inspiration for the new line.
As a child growing up in Benin and Port Harcourt, she wanted to become a doctor. She graduated with a degree in microbiology, but her love for fashion and Asoke fabrics overtook all academic pursuits. Her visits to the markets and her Ghanaian tailor, who gave life to her sketches, became more frequent. After a brief stint as a computer analyst, Ekpecham married at the age of 28, and between changing nappies, tailored wedding gowns and traditional outfits out of her garage.
Describing herself “a passionate go-getter”, Ekpecham’s goal is to start her own manufacturing unit in Lagos in 2015. London is only a six-hour flight away, and the new venture will see her returning home more often.
<h1>Riding A Wave</h1>
Noni Rwaxa, better known as the radio jockey ‘Ms Cosmo’, who hosts The Stir Up hip hop show on radio station 5FM, is now part of a collaborative campaign between Australian jewelry firm Mimco and Frends to promote – what else – headphones.
The 26-year-old radio personality, also a veejay on Channel O, has opened for big artists like Kanye West, Chris Brown, Kendrick Lamar and 2 Chainz.
Her family wanted her to take on the tried and tested route through education. She had other plans.
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“My father’s concern was for me to get a tertiary qualification. I graduated with a BCom degree in finance from the University of Johannesburg; my mother still finds it amusing when I pack my equipment for an event,” says Rwaxa.
After graduating, she worked as a property finance consultant. The time she spent in the corporate space is a period she describes as the worst, as she suffered depression. It was clearly not for her.
Hip hop musician Khuli Chana suggested she join the Fuse Academy school for female disc jockeys. She enrolled and after the course, made inroads in radio in 2012. She was invited to play on Channel O Bassment, and YFM, a South African youth radio station. She finally joined 5FM hosting The Stir Up.
“I’m happy the projections for radio in South Africa are positive. That said, I can’t ignore what is happening in Ghana, Kenya and particularly Nigeria. Nigerian artists are collaborating with international acts. Nat-C, Davido and P-Square are breaking boundaries putting in the hard work to reap rewards.”
She wants to be in the industry for the long haul, and is doing everything to ensure the longevity of her brand.
“I have sought partnerships with various brands for growth for myself and the brand of choice, as hip hop is cool influential culture…I have two other event deals I want to announce but you will have to wait until January.”
Watch this space for more.

Designs On Africa

For South Africa, September 12, 2014 will forever be remembered as a dark day. It was the day a collapsed church hostel in a densely-populated Lagos district brought sorrow, tears and grief to families across the country.
“I didn’t know what to expect, but I’m glad I saw her even though I couldn’t talk to her.”
These are the words of relief from Mantshebo Sefali that told the pain of many waiting to be reunited with family members that were caught in the chaos of a collapsed building in Lagos belonging to the Synagogue Church of All Nations (SCOAN).
Scores of relatives clustered at the Steve Biko Academic Hospital in South Africa’s capital Pretoria to get news about their injured family flown back from Nigeria. Some brought bouquets, others sat in the car park in stunned silence. Many couldn’t believe how a religious pilgrimage could end in tragedy.
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Inside the hospital, Lizzie Sefali lay unconscious. Doctors and nurses talked to the Sefali family before they were allowed inside. Mantshebo’s tears poured down as two aunts from her family stood up and embraced her. Mantshebo’s aunt, Thembi Khoza, had gone to the church with Lizzie.
They are just two of hundreds of Nigerians and South Africans who felt the pain following the collapse of the guest house that belonged to the church.
“My mother went with her sister to the church. My aunt usually goes every year, just for a week and this time she went with my mother,” says Sefali, a second year student studying tourism at the University
of Johannesburg.
About 115 people, 84 of them South Africans, reportedly died in the fatal accident, with more than 100, including Nigerians and citizens from other countries, sustaining serious injuries.
The deceased South Africans had gone on a pilgrimage to The Synagogue, as devotees usually refer to their church. Like many others before them from around the world who come to The Synagogue for spiritual rejuvenation, these South Africans hoped to return home hale and hearty. Instead, they will go back home in body bags, leaving officials of both nations in a diplomatic logjam and in search of an explanation for the building’s collapse.
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“Not in the recent history of our country have we had this large number of our people die in one incident outside the country… The whole nation shares the pain of the mothers, fathers, daughters and sons who have lost their loved ones. We are all in grief,” says South Africa’s President Jacob Zuma.
The collapse reignited public debate on the sorry state of standards in the construction and urban planning sectors in Africa’s most populous nation. Rescuers and Nigeria’s National Emergency Management Agency say the hostel had been overburdened by the construction of additional floors. However, leader of SCOAN and popular televangelist, TB Joshua has his own theories of what happened. He claims the militant Islamic sect Boko Haram attacked his building, and later posted footage online of a low-flying aircraft ostensibly hovering above an uncompleted multi-storey building before it collapsed.
He is a charismatic preacher, counting presidents and prime ministers among his flock, giving him considerable political clout. Former Malawian head of state Joyce Banda once described Joshua as her spiritual father. He is believed to boost Nigeria’s tourism sector with disciples flocking to worship at The Synagogue from all over the world. The Synagogue, a massive eye-popping piece of real estate which seats about 15,000, is believed to be worth between $10 million and $15 million.
Joshua, a controversial figure dubbed The Prophet by his followers, claims to have foreseen the Malaysian Airlines MH17 plane crash, the Boston Marathon bombings and the results of Nigerian football matches. As the Lagos State Government issued a statement suggesting that the building was an illegal structure with defective structural works, many Nigerians have wondered why Joshua failed to foresee the collapse of his own building.

Tag: Lagos

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