Igho Sanomi, a Nigerian oil trader, aged 38 made the Venutres Africa list of billionaires on the continent. Here’s a look into who the media-shy money entrepreneur and philanthropist is.
Sanomi is the Founder/CEO ofTaleveras Group and Chairman, Dickens Sanomi Foundation. On 17 May 1975, in Agbor Delta State, the late Dickens Patrick Sanomi, retired Assistant Inspector General of the Nigerian Police and Mabel Iyabo Sanomi, Yeye Jemo of Isotun Ijesha Kingdom, Osun State, welcomed their fifth child (and first son).
Shortly, after completing his Bachelor’s Degree in Geology and Mining from the University of Jos in Northern Nigeria, Sanomi went into the business world, where he rose quickly to the position of Executive Director with Sarian Oil and Cosmos Oil AG, Cosmos Oil AG; an international Oil Trading Company with its core activities in West Africa.
He was credited to have, as the Executive Director of the company; single-handedly developed the company’s trading operations by negotiating the export and delivery of fuel oils from West Africa to the United States Gulf Coast. It was said on his website, that the billionaire, while working for the company, “developed a strategic alliance with a major international oil trading group based in Zug, Switzerland. This partnership oversaw the import and export of millions of tons of refined petroleum products to and from the West African coast.”
In 2004, Sanomi founded the Taleveras Group, of which he is currently the CEO. Some have said his decision to become an entrepreneur may have been influenced by his mother, who was a renowned medical entrepreneur. Deciding to pursue his entrepreneurial dreams, he merged all of his business activities into one and founded a company with a vision and drive to become “a leading Global Energy & Service Company,” with offices in London, Geneva, Cape Town, Dubai, Ivory Coast, Abuja and Lagos.
Forbes had it that the company “trades over 100 million barrels of crude oil as well as several million tons of gasoline, LPG and jet fuel. In April 2012, Taleveras acquired production sharing contracts (PSCs) for three offshore oil blocks in Ivory Coast. In June 2013, Taleveras sold a 65 per cent stake in one of its Ivorian offshore upstream projects to Lukoil of Russia for an undisclosed price. Taleveras also owns a stake in a power distribution firm in Nigeria.”
Sanomi is also Chairman of the Dickens Sanomi Foundation, a non-profit charitable organisation which he founded in memory of his late father.
He also sits as Chairman and co-Chairman of various companies Board of Directors, which he founded or co-founded. These companies’ activities span from telecoms to shipping, aviation and real estate investments, worldwide.
[Tribune]