The Black Billionaires 2019: #11. Abdulsamad Rabiu to #14. Jay-Z
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Of the 2,153 people who made it to the 2019 FORBES list of the World’s Billionaires, 14 of them are Billionaires of African Ancestry, up from 11 a year ago.
These are the 14 richest black people on earth:
(Photo by Earl Gibson III/Getty Images for NAACP) GETTY14. Jay-Z, $1 billion
American, Artist
Though he’s hip-hop’s first billionaire, Jay-Z’s lead on the rest of the pack is even larger if his entire family fortune is taken into consideration: He and wife Beyoncé are now worth a combined $1.4 billion. So much for the notion that music is a dying business.
“To convince artists that you can’t be an artist and make money … was the greatest trick in music that people ever pulled off,” Jay-Z told Forbes in 2010. “I think the people that were making the millions said that.”
forbes.com
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13. Mohammed Ibrahim, $1.1 billion
British, Mobile Telecoms, Investments
Sudanese-born Mohammed “Mo” Ibrahim founded Celtel International in 1998, one of the first mobile phone companies serving Africa and the Middle East. He sold it to Kuwait’s Mobile Telecommunications Company for $3.4 billion in 2005 and pocketed $1.4 billion. In 2006 he founded the Mo Ibrahim Foundation which promotes good governance in Africa.
forbes.com12. Folorunsho Alakija, $1.1 billion
Nigerian, Oil
Nigeria’s first female billionaire is the founder of Famfa Oil, a Nigerian company that owns a substantial participating interest in OML 127, a lucrative oil block on the Agbami deep-water oilfield in Nigeria. Alakija started off as a secretary in a Nigerian merchant bank in the 1970s, then quit her job to study fashion design in England. Upon her return, she founded a Nigerian fashion label that catered to upscale clientele, including Maryam Babangida, wife to Nigeria’s former military president Ibrahim Babangida.
forbes.com11. Abdulsamad Rabiu, $1.6 billion
Nigerian, Cement, Sugar
Abdulsamad Rabiu is the founder of BUA Group, a Nigerian conglomerate with interests in sugar refining, cement production, real estate, steel, port concessions, manufacturing, oil gas, and shipping. BUA Group’s annual revenues are estimated at over $2 billion. Abdulsamad got his start in business working for his father, Isyaku Rabiu, a successful businessman from Nigeria’s Northern region. He struck out on his own in 1988, importing rice, sugar, edible oils as well as steel and iron rods.
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