Tanzanian industrialist Mohamed Dewji has despite losing 200 million dollars of his net worth climbed two places in the latest Forbes billionaire list while emerging as the only dollar billionaire in East Africa.
In the latest rankings published by Forbes Magazine, Dewji popularly known as Mo has been ranked as the 13th richest individual in Africa and the 1,913th globally with a fortune of 1.5 billion dollars.
Mo is the founder and CEO of Mohamed Enterprises Tanzania Limited (METL) which produces textile manufacturing, flour milling, beverages and edible oils. METL operates in at least six African countries with a workforce of 37,000 employees.
According to Forbes the fortunes of Africa’s dollar billionaires has shrunk by 1.3 billion dollars over the last 12 months due to soaring stock prices in the region.
“As a group, the continent’s 19 billionaires are worth an estimated 81.5 billion dollars – down from 84.9 billion dollars a year ago, despite one more billionaire in the ranks. The 4 percent dip follows a 15 percent jump last year on the back of soaring stock prices across the region,” said Forbes.
“Nigerian industrialist Aliko Dangote, whose fortune dropped 400 million dollars to 13.5 billion, is the richest person for the 12th year in a row, and South African luxury goods magnate Johann Rupert held onto no. 2 for a second year, despite falling 300 million dollars to 10.7 billion dollars.”