Africa’s foremost philanthropist and president of the Dangote Group Aliko Dangote has bagged ABU’s top Corporate Award. The Award was conferred on him by the Ahmadu Bello University Alumni Association. Eyes Of Lagos gathered that, The 2018 Corporate Award was presented to the top industrialist in view of the numerous contributions of his conglomerate to the development of the educational sector in Nigeria, the Association’s National President Professor Ahmed Tijani Mora said. Professor Mora said the interventions of the Aliko Dangote Foundation in the educational sector over the years have been unprecedented through, especially, the sponsorship of various scholarship programmes. Reading his citation, Professor Mora said apart from the $100million donation to fight malnutrition, Mr. Dangote is a ‘dedicated philanthropist’ who has also “made an initial endowment of $1.25billion to the Aliko Dangote Foundation in March 2014.” He said Dangote Foundation has constructed 10 blocks of hostels for ABU Zaria. According to him, the Association has 12 governors as alumni, adding that one in every four Nigerian is governed by the alumni of the school. The Dangote Academy located in Obajana Kogi State is yet another contribution of the Group to education to Nigeria, he said. The Group’s executive director, Stakeholders Management and Corporate Communication Engr Ahmed Mansur who received the award on behalf of Africa’s richest person Aliko Dangote, said the award will spur the conglomerate to scale up its intervention programmes in all sectors. Mr. Mansur, while thanking the Association, said the Dangote Group will not rest on its oars in ensuring that the educational sector achieved its rightful place in Nigeria. He said the Dangote Group has pumped billions of naira into the educational sector over the years, even as it planned to officially launched another multi-million naira hostel, with the capacity to accommodate 1,440 students at the Ahmadu Bello University, Zaria. It would be recalled that the Group had only recently donated a World Class Dangote Business School worth N1.2bn to the Bayero University Kano, and building another one in University of Ibadan worth N250million. Earlier, it donated N200 million to Katsina State University while N500 million for Bayero State University Business School in Kano. Funding was also provided for the construction of a 500 capacity student hostel complex of the University of Science and Technology, Wudil. The Group also gave N118 million for a squash complex project at the University of Nigeria, Nsukka main campus and another N50 million to the University of Port Harcourt, as well as N100million for the proposed Otuoke University. Speaking earlier, the Vice Chancellor of the University Professor Ibrahim Garba commended the awardees, and added that all hands must be on the deck to rescue the educational sector. Professor Garba said out of the about eighty thousand applicants yearly, of which thirty thousand are qualified, only 11,500 eventually get admitted due to limited facility. Other awardees include: Deputy Secretary General of the UN, Amina J. Muhammad, the SGF, Boss Mustafa, NNPC MD, Maikanti Baru, NPA MD, Hadiza Bala Usman, Ace Banker Hayatudeen Muhammad and the Governors of Gombe, Nasarawa, Kebbi, Kano, Bauchi and Adamawa among others.
