Aliko Dangote’s journey to becoming one of Africa’s richest men started when he was just 19. He first spent a year working in his uncle’s transport business in Kano. Then his grandfather, Sanusi Dantata, gave him three trucks and told him to start his own business. In 1976, Dangote went to Lagos to collect ₦18,000 ($29,000 at the time) he had lent to his uncle, Usman Dantata. His uncle did not have the cash, so he gave Dangote bags of cement instead. Dangote sold the cement and made ₦6,000 ($9,700) on top of the money he was owed. That was when he saw that business in Lagos moved much faster than in the North. So he stayed. His uncle gave him two trucks of cement to sell. Dangote added ₦50,000 ($80,600) of his own money and borrowed another ₦50,000 ($80,600) from his grandfather. Soon, he was making about ₦2,500 ($4,000) a day. What started as a debt that was paid in cement became the first step toward an empire now worth tens of billions of dollars. Source: Aliko Dangote...