Nigeria's refining revolution: Dangote's gambit and Africa's industrial destiny

    Oluyemi Adeosun | Editor’s picks | Nov 07, 2025    
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In the annals of African industrialisation, moments of genuine triumph are as scarce as they are instructive. The Dangote Group's announcement to double its refinery capacity from 650,000 to 1.4 million barrels per day qualifies as one such moment—not merely for its audacity, but for what it signals about Africa's capacity to chart its own economic course. When completed, this facility will dethrone India's Jamnagar as the world's largest single-train refinery. This is more than engineering bravado. For a continent that has long exported crude oil only to import refined products at ruinous cost, it represents a fundamental reordering of economic logic. Nigeria, Africa's largest crude producer, has for decades embodied this paradox: energy-rich yet perpetually queuing for petrol. The expansion promises to end this indignity.

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