South Sudan Leaders Amass Great Wealth as Nation Suffers –Africa Business Roundup

Fuel ‘too dirty’ for Europe sold to Africa

Swiss firms have been criticized in a report for their links to the African trade in diesel with toxin levels that are illegal in Europe.

Campaign group Public Eye says retailers are exploiting weak regulatory standards.

Three of the distribution companies mentioned in the report have responded by saying that they meet the regulatory requirements of the market and have no vested interest in keeping sulphur levels higher than they need to be.

More…

Nigeria will not increase petrol price despite crude and currency crises

Nigeria will not increase its gasoline prices, President Muhammadu Buhari told his oil minister and state oil firm head, summoned to his villa last week, sources at

Months of unrest in the Delta region has also cut Nigeria’s oil output and left as little as half the crude available that it needs to swap for refined motor fuel from trading companies.

More…

South Sudan Leaders Amass Great Wealth as Nation Suffers, Report Says

A report by an advocacy group in Washington suggests that a desire to gain control of natural resources, not an ethnic feud, is at the root of the conflict.

The families and top associates of the principal opponents in the conflict, President Salva Kiir and his rival and former vice president, Riek Machar, own multimillion-dollar properties, drive luxury cars and stay at expensive hotels, “all while much of their country’s population suffers from the consequences of a brutal civil war and, in many places, experiences near-famine conditions,” according to the report.

More…

Why Africa Remains Ripe for Private Equity

For the past decade, Africa has been one of the world’s hottest growth markets for private equity investment. In the early 1990s, a mere dozen Africa-based funds managed a combined $1 billion; today, more than 200 funds manage upwards of $30 billion. More funds are making more deals in more industries and more countries—and are making more successful exits.

The expectations of investors in private equity funds are also rising as development finance institutions are being joined by global institutional investors that are far more focused on high returns. Find out why.

To reach millennial customers, this Kenyan telecom giant tried shopping like them

For the last 16 years Safaricom, Kenya’s largest publicly traded company and East Africa’s largest telecom, has focused on signing up more mobile subscribers.

However, competition is becoming more intense and customers have more choices. Safaricom, while dominant, lacked customer loyalty, its executives realized more than a year ago.

More…