President of Dangote Industries Limited, Aliko Dangote, has attributed the high price of petrol in Nigeria partly to the continued smuggling of the commodity to neighbouring countries where it sells for significantly more.

Dangote said petrol prices in neighbouring countries were between 30 and 50 per cent higher than in Nigeria, arguing that the price difference creates a strong financial incentive for traders to move petrol out of the country.

He stated this in an interview aired on Arise TV on Tuesday while speaking about petrol prices and the availability of the product amid the ongoing crisis in the Middle East.

Explaining why Nigerians may perceive petrol as expensive despite the country producing the commodity domestically, Dangote said the price could not be considered in isolation from the prices in neighbouring countries.

“You know, expensive is relative. In the sense that today, maybe, you know, a lot of them, there’s ignorance also. What they need to do is ask, what is the neighbour’s price?”

He said the continued movement of Nigerian petrol across the borders was partly driven by the significant difference between domestic prices and those obtainable in neighbouring countries.

“I don’t know if you know that there’s still a lot of smuggling of the same petrol we are producing to our neighbouring countries.”

The price gap means that petrol bought in Nigeria can potentially be resold across the border at a substantial premium.

Dangote said this creates an incentive for smugglers to divert petrol meant for the Nigerian market rather than sell it domestically.

“Because those neighbouring countries are about 30 to 50 per cent more expensive than Nigeria. So, it’s not actually like for like.”

Dangote specifically cited Niger, where he said petrol was selling at a premium of between 20 and 25 per cent compared with Nigeria.

He used the example to illustrate why the border trade could be financially attractive, particularly when the price difference is large enough to provide an immediate return on the commodity.

“And people can now go and ask, okay, fine, what is the price of, even now at N1,350? Okay, the price in Niger is 20 to 25 per cent more than Nigeria,” he said.

He questioned what other legitimate business could provide such an immediate return.

“So, what business are you going to do that will make you have an instant 25 per cent return?” he asked.

Dangote further explained how petrol intended for domestic distribution could allegedly be diverted towards the border for sale to buyers in neighbouring countries.

“So, it means that, yes, you take the [petrol], you go and take it across the border. You pretend you are taking it to Sokoto, you go and just take it to Ilela, and you sell.

“Actually, they don’t have.”

The implication, according to Dangote, is that a product that should remain available to Nigerian consumers can be moved out of the country because of the higher prices obtainable across the border.

Beyond the issue of price, however, Dangote said the current crisis in the Middle East could pose a different challenge to the Nigerian downstream market.

He warned that the major concern could shift from how much petrol costs to whether sufficient volumes would be available to consumers.

“And the problem now, going forward, I must also warn that this crisis in the Middle East is not even about price; it’s about availability,” Dangote said.

The comment comes against the backdrop of concerns over how developments in the Middle East could affect global energy markets, including the availability and cost of petroleum products.

Asked whether Nigerians should be worried about petrol supplies, Dangote said the Dangote refinery was prepared to continue meeting domestic demand.

“We will deliver to Nigeria. Nigerians don’t need to worry. There will not be any shortage from our own part.

“There won’t be any shortage. There will not be any queues. We will make sure that we keep satisfying the market, despite all odds,” Dangote added.

The remarks came as investors flooded the Nigerian Exchange on Monday following the opening of the initial public offering of Dangote Petroleum Refinery and Petrochemicals.

The N2.15tn IPO was formally opened during the opening gong ceremony at the NGX trading floor in Marina, Lagos, with Dangote sounding the gong to mark the commencement of the offer.

The refinery became the first petroleum refinery to be offered to investors on the Nigerian stock market in the Exchange’s 66-year history.

The IPO comprises 4.1 billion ordinary shares offered at N525 per share, with a minimum subscription of 10 shares valued at N5,250.

The offer is open to retail, institutional and eligible African investors and is scheduled to close on October 13, 2026.

The mother of a black woman whose body was found hanging from a tree in Jackson, Mississippi, has told the BBC she is still waiting for answers from officials more than a month later.

Her demands have been echoed by a community in the southern US state that has been left shocked and angry.

After weeks of silence, police on Tuesday confirmed for the first time that they were investigating the death of Tasia Fortune, 29, as a potential homicide – while clarifying that her official cause of death has yet to be confirmed.
Authorities discovered Fortune’s body on 3 August, hanging from a tree in the lot of an abandoned home.

Local concern over her death has been heightened by the fact that the state has a dark history of racial violence and lynchings.
The majority-black city has been left on edge. As the question lingers as to how Fortune died, petitions online signed by tens of thousands of people have called for more transparency, and members of US Congress have asked for federal intervention.

“It’s making me angry,” Fortune’s mother, Christy Spivey, said. “What is the hold up?”
Spivey described desperate attempts to understand the status of the investigation and how multiple enquiries to police had gone unanswered.

The first update she had received from authorities in weeks came in a public city meeting on Tuesday evening as Jackson Police Chief RaShall Brackney discussed the case and said the department “has been investigating this case from day one as a homicide”.

Brackney, in a statement to the BBC, elaborated and said the department always treats any pending death case as a “potential homicide” so that crucial evidence is not lost as police wait on autopsy results.

The department, though, had only previously described the case as a death investigation.
Tuesday’s statement from Brackney said “we are conducting the investigation at the highest appropriate level while we await the medical examiner’s findings”, which would include an official cause and manner of death.

The medical examiner’s office said it would not comment on the pending case.
Christy Spivey Tasia Fortune holds a finger to her lips and smiles in a family handout photoChristy Spivey

Spivey last saw her daughter alive on 26 July, when Fortune had travelled from Mississippi, where she had lived for roughly the last decade, to Kentucky, where Spivey lives, for a family reunion.

The next time she saw her daughter – in a funeral home, days before her burial – she could barely look at her body.
“I didn’t look straight at her. Her daddy did,” she said. “I kind of looked from the side.”

Spivey remembered their last conversation. “She was talking about, you know, maybe even coming home,” she explained.
Fortune’s death has left the community concerned that racial violence in Mississippi could be on the rise again. And in the absence of concrete details about the case, their suspicions are left to fester.

Fortune’s death was the third incident in Mississippi in less than a year where police found someone dead and hanged from a tree.
The other two bodies – one black male, one white – were discovered in September 2025, on the exact same day.

Both were ruled a suicide, though the mother of one of the deceased – Trey Reed – contests those findings.

Fed-up residents have launched an online petition, which has gathered more than 50,000 signatures, for an independent investigation into the state’s chief medical examiner, Dr Staci Turner, over the handling of a recent spate of cases involving people of colour. Another petition asks for the FBI to launch an investigation into Fortune’s death
The BBC has asked Turner for comment.

Jackson City Councilman Kenneth Stokes has also expressed concerns about the police investigation, saying he’d been outside the home where Fortune was thought to have lived multiple times and has never seen officers.
“All cases are important, but this one – a hanging in Mississippi – should rise to the top of the food chain,” Stokes said.

He told the BBC he sent letters to both federal prosecutors at the Mississippi US attorney’s office and the FBI weeks ago, urging that the investigation was “in dire need of assistance”. He has yet to hear back from either.
“Nothing from nobody,” Stokes said. “It’s like nobody cares.”

The BBC has reached out to the Mississippi US attorney’s office and the local FBI office for comment.
US Congresswoman Jasmine Crockett has similarly requested federal intervention. In a letter to the US Department of Justice, she asked for an investigation into recent deaths in Mississippi – including that of Tasia Fortune – calling them “possible cases of modern-day lynchings”. She cited the state’s “appalling historical reputation of violent terrorism against black Americans”.
ADVERTISEMENT

In addition to Mississippi, there have been multiple other cases nationally of black Americans found hanged from trees, including four in North Carolina this year alone. Three were ruled a suicide. An autopsy is pending for the fourth death.

The BBC has reached out to the justice department for comment.
Stokes is clear that he does not know whether Fortune’s death was a lynching, or whether race played a part at all. Nor does he care. He just wants answers.

Brandon King, president of the student National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) chapter at nearby Jackson State University, said the mystery of Fortune’s death, combined with minimal updates from police, has led him and others to be “extra cautious” around campus.
The feeling, King said, was that “hey, you could be next. This is in Jackson. This is in your backyard”.

The thought is extra worrying, he continued, because “this is supposed to be the capital. This is where I’m supposed to feel the most safe”.

As for Spivey, she cried before heading to a funeral home for her daughter, dreading having to fill out a death certificate and decide whether to cremate or bury her firstborn child.
She wanted to cremate her daughter but decided, in the end, for a burial. She said she was holding out hope there would be updates in the investigation, which might mean needing to exhume her corpse.  BBC

President Bola Ahmed Tinubu has appointed Mr Abel Olumuyiwa Enitan as the Head of the Civil Service of the Federation, effective from Thursday, August 27, 2026.

Mr Enitan succeeds Mrs Didi Esther Walson-Jack, who will retire soon from the Federal Civil Service upon attaining the statutory retirement age of 60.

Mr Enitan, native of Osun State, is the most senior Permanent Secretary in the Federal Civil Service.

He has served as Permanent Secretary for seven years and seven months, working at the Ministry of Police Affairs, the Ministry of Humanitarian Affairs, and the Office of the Vice President. He is currently the Permanent Secretary in the Federal Ministry of Education.

He brings considerable institutional experience and a deep understanding of how the Federal Civil Service works to his new responsibility.

President Tinubu expresses his profound appreciation to Mrs Walson-Jack for her distinguished service to the nation and for the reforms, impact and innovations witnessed in the Civil Service during her tenure.

The President wishes her a fulfilling and successful life after service and conveys the nation’s gratitude for her years of dedicated and impactful public service.

President Tinubu charges the incoming Head of the Civil Service of the Federation to consolidate on the reforms and innovations already underway, deepen professionalism and efficiency across the service, and build a more effective and responsive Civil Service capable of delivering on the administration’s Renewed Hope Agenda.

The President further urges Mr Enitan to lead a Civil Service that is professional, merit-driven, accountable, innovative, and responsive to Nigerians’ needs and aspirations.

Enitan was born on December 12, 1966. He had his secondary education at Ajibode Grammar School, Ibadan and the College of Arts and Science, Ile-Ife. He later attended the University of Lagos and graduated in 1988 with a B.Sc. in Finance and Banking.

In 2015, Enitan obtained an M.Sc. in Public Policy Analysis from Nasarawa State University, Lafia.