Dangote Cement pulls in heavyweights to boost its board

Dangote Cement appointed former Xstrata CEO Mick Davis as a non-executive director alongside Cherie Blair, a lawyer and the wife of former UK prime minister Tony Blair, as Nigeria’s largest company looks to strengthen its board.

The company, owned by Africa’s richest man, Aliko Dangote, also named Joseph Makoju as permanent CEO after a four-month stint in an acting capacity, according to two e-mailed statements on Monday.

While the continent’s biggest cement producer did not give a reason for the high-profile non-executive director appointments, people familiar with the matter said in February that Dangote had revived plans for a share sale in London that could raise about $1bn.

Discussions were ongoing and a listing might or might not go ahead, they said.

Makoju’s appointment “points to a good direction for succession planning and corporate governance”, Olalekan Olabode, equity analyst at Vetiva Capital Management, said by phone from Lagos. The appointment of Cherie Blair “is a way of improving the quality of the members of the board, which is positive for the planned London listing”, he said.

Davis ran Xstrata, the mining giant now owned by Glencore, for 12 years to the end of 2013. He is now the chairman of Macsteel and the CEO of the UK’s ruling Conservative party