Nigerian billionaire Igho Sanomi grants first ever interview to Forbes

Nigerian billionaire Igho Sanomi recently granted an interview to Forbes magazine where he talked about the real story of how he built his business and wealth. According to Forbes.

Igho Sanomi, 42, is the founder of Taleveras, a $2 billion (revenues) international commodities trading company active over a wide spectrum of global energy markets including crude oil and refined petroleum products, natural gas and power.
Taleveras’ trading arm, now based in Dubai and Abuja, is one of the largest independent energy traders in Africa, with additional offices spread across West Africa, Europe and Asia. The company at its prime moved more than 170 million barrels of crude and oil products annually, and has upstream and downstream assets in a number of African countries.

Sanomi is famously media shy, despite owning one of the largest oil trading companies in Africa and running a philanthropic organization, the Dickens Sanomi Foundation, that donates millions of dollars annually to causes in education and health in Africa and elsewhere. He has twice been recognized by the world-renowned Institute Choiseul based in France, topping the ranks of the Choiseul 100: Economic Leaders for Tomorrow, which ranks young African leaders under 40 who will play a major role in the economic development of the African continent. 

Sanomi has traditionally stayed away from the media spotlight, but he’s finally breaking cover, and for good reason.

“It’s easy to get caught up and carried away by the media hype,” he says briskly, chopping the air for emphasis. “All I ever wanted to do was to quietly build a successful company, keeping to the old traditional way of doing business with a handshake, and performing the contracts we got very well. But as we got successful, a lot of people began to make up stories about us. At first we decided to ignore all the noise and focus on the business, but now it’s gotten to a tipping point and I think it’s a good idea to set the record straight.”

Read the full interview Forbes