Abdulsamand Rabiu, Nigeria’s renowned cement and sugar businessman, is currently in the news for gaining $650 million after the cement firm merger getting sanctioned recently.
Reportedly, the merger between Rabiu’s BUA Cement’s subsidiary company, Kalambaina Cement and the publicly traded CCNN (Cement Company of Northern Nigeria) has received approval from the SEC (Securities and Exchange Commission) along with the requisite consent of Nigeria’s Federal High Court. Subsequently, CCNN is being pronounced as the second largest cement producer in Nigeria after Dangote Cement, the African behemoth.
Sources closely related to the matter revealed that last year, the Board of Directors of CCNN had approached the NSE (Nigerian Stock exchange) with a merger proposal with the Kalambaina Cement Company Ltd. Both CCNN and Kalambaina Cement, for the record, are situated in Sokoto, northwest Nigeria.
According to the CEO of CCNN, Ibrahim Aminu, the proposed merger will significantly position Sokoto-based CCNN for improved competitiveness within its domestic market and will also enable it to utilize Kalambaina’s modern plant and equipment to strengthen its export potential as well as market penetration.
It has also been reported that after the completion of the merger, new CCNN shares have been issued and distributed to all the shareholders of Kalambaina Cement Company in exchange for their shares in the same.
On an aggregate, 11,886,823,259 new Kalambaina Cement shares at N25.99 per share have been issued besides the 1.257 billion CCNN shares, which has brought the current volume of shares to 13.1 billion for the entire combined entity, cite relevant sources. Sources further claim that the new merged company has 2 million tons per annum installed capacity and has recently had its shares recorded on the Nigerian Stock exchange.
It has been reported that the Nigerian cement tycoon, Rabiu, owns over 12.7 billion shares – equivalent to about 97 per cent of the novel entity (and valued at over $650 million at current market prices) – through BUA Cement Company, BUA International Limited, and Damnaz Cement Company Ltd.