{"id":11216,"date":"2016-08-29T16:44:36","date_gmt":"2016-08-29T16:44:36","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/newsroom247.com.ng\/?p=11216"},"modified":"2016-08-29T16:44:36","modified_gmt":"2016-08-29T16:44:36","slug":"reuters-confirms-massive-corruption-in-foreign-exchange-sales-buhari-favours-dangote-firms-with-official-rate","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/newsroom247.com.ng\/?p=11216","title":{"rendered":"Reuters confirms massive corruption in foreign exchange sales: Buhari favours Dangote firms with official rate"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><code><script src=\"\/\/pagead2.googlesyndication.com\/pagead\/js\/adsbygoogle.js\" async=\"\"><\/script><br \/>\n <!-- www.deltanewsroom.com --><br \/>\n <ins class=\"adsbygoogle\" style=\"display: block;\" data-ad-client=\"ca-pub-2163942495525027\" data-ad-slot=\"1411897411\" data-ad-format=\"auto\"><\/ins><br \/>\n<script>\/\/ <![CDATA[\n(adsbygoogle = window.adsbygoogle || []).push({});\n\/\/ ]]><\/script><\/code><\/p>\n<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" src=\"https:\/\/www.alternativeadvert.com\/show.php?z=30&amp;pl=10152&amp;ad_type=59&amp;rl=180\" width=\"300\" height=\"250\" frameborder=\"0\" marginwidth=\"0\" marginheight=\"0\" scrolling=\"no\"><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p>As Nigeria grapples with a foreign exchange crisis, one person stands out in the scramble to obtain hard currency: Aliko Dangote, Africa\u2019s richest man.<\/p>\n<p>When the government restricted the supply of dollars in June 2015 to prop up the value of the Nigerian naira, firms owned by Dangote landed a healthy share of dollars available at the cheap official rate, a study by Reuters shows.<\/p>\n<p>Reuters examined foreign currency transactions made during an 11-week period in March to May this year. Over that time, Dangote businesses were able to buy at least $161 million in hard currency from the central bank. That was around nine percent of all the hard currency the bank sold over the period. In a single week in March, one dollar in every eight went to Dangote companies. There is not enough data to see how that stacks up with the companies\u2019 share of foreign trade.<\/p>\n<p>C<a href=\"http:\/\/newsroom247.com.ng\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/06\/dangote.jpg\" rel=\"attachment wp-att-9707\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignnone size-medium wp-image-9707\" src=\"http:\/\/newsroom247.com.ng\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/06\/dangote-300x137.jpg\" alt=\"dangote\" width=\"300\" height=\"137\" srcset=\"http:\/\/newsroom247.com.ng\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/06\/dangote-300x137.jpg 300w, http:\/\/newsroom247.com.ng\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/06\/dangote.jpg 332w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px\" \/><\/a>ompared with buying dollars on the more expensive unofficial market, though, Dangote companies benefited to the tune of about $100 million.<\/p>\n<p>The wrangling for dollars highlights Dangote\u2019s pivotal role as Africa\u2019s biggest economy tries to diversify away from oil.<\/p>\n<p>Over the past year, Nigeria pegged its currency, the naira, to the U.S. dollar at an official rate of 197-199 naira. The central bank doled out dollars at the official rate to companies it deemed strategic to the Nigerian economy. Until June 20, when the bank abandoned the peg, anyone else had to pay a lot more on the black market.<\/p>\n<p>Small businesses complained that the foreign exchange restrictions were forcing them out of business. Frank\u00a0Jacobs, president of the\u00a0Manufacturers\u2019\u00a0Association of\u00a0Nigeria, said that the majority of manufacturers \u2013 2,000 of them \u2013 had been unable to source raw materials because they could not obtain dollars to pay for imports. Up to 100 firms either shut completely or cut production, he said. \u201cThe large companies have better clout.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>newsrescue.com<\/p>\n<p><script src=\"\/\/pagead2.googlesyndication.com\/pagead\/js\/adsbygoogle.js\" async=\"\"><\/script><br \/>\n <!-- www.deltanewsroom.com --><br \/>\n <ins class=\"adsbygoogle\" style=\"display: block;\" data-ad-client=\"ca-pub-2163942495525027\" data-ad-slot=\"1411897411\" data-ad-format=\"auto\"><\/ins><br \/>\n<script>\/\/ <![CDATA[\n(adsbygoogle = window.adsbygoogle || []).push({});\n\/\/ ]]><\/script><\/p>\n<p><code><iframe loading=\"lazy\" src=\"https:\/\/www.alternativeadvert.com\/show.php?z=30&amp;pl=10152&amp;ad_type=59&amp;rl=180\" width=\"300\" height=\"250\" frameborder=\"0\" marginwidth=\"0\" marginheight=\"0\" scrolling=\"no\"><\/iframe><\/code><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>As Nigeria grapples with a foreign exchange crisis, one person stands out in the scramble to obtain hard currency: Aliko Dangote, Africa\u2019s richest man. When the government restricted the supply of dollars in June 2015 to prop up the value of the Nigerian naira, firms owned by Dangote landed a healthy share of dollars available [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":6,"featured_media":9707,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_exactmetrics_skip_tracking":false,"ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"spay_email":"","footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_is_tweetstorm":false},"categories":[1],"tags":[273,2863,2864],"class_list":["post-11216","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-business","tag-aliko-dangote","tag-frank-jacobs","tag-manufacturers-association-of-nigeria"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"http:\/\/newsroom247.com.ng\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/06\/dangote.jpg","jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p4oswh-2UU","_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/newsroom247.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11216","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/newsroom247.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/newsroom247.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/newsroom247.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/6"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/newsroom247.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=11216"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"http:\/\/newsroom247.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11216\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":11217,"href":"http:\/\/newsroom247.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11216\/revisions\/11217"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/newsroom247.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/9707"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/newsroom247.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=11216"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/newsroom247.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=11216"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/newsroom247.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=11216"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}