Aliko Dangote’s Prodigal Brother, Sanni + How he is running his Dansa Foods aground

There is a Yoruba saying that warns against looking at the achievement of somebody else in our pursuit of money, wealth and other material things as such may lead to disappointment since we are all made with our different unique features; but this is directly playing out in Sanni, the intelligent but over-ambitious younger brother of Africa’s richest man Alhaji Aliko Dangote, who is the chairman/chief executive officer of Dansa Foods as well as the vice-president of Dangote Group.
Investigation reveals that Harvard-trained Sanni Dangote has been over-stressing his personal company all because he sees his brother as a competitor, whereas the brother who is generally addressed as Africa’s richest man sees him only as his brother. It was before now the belief of many that Dansa Foods was a subsidiary of Dangote Group as the company’s sales cars carry the logo of Dangote Group. The company’s warehouses are usually in the same premises as that of Dangote Group; the difference is just that the company is solely own by Sanni Dangote.
Years back, the company that has its factory somewhere around Abule-Oshun, was thriving in the country as it could confidently compete with other companies that were into the production and distribution of fruit juice with its Dansa fruit juice. After that the company’s dairy product, Ziza, which is without doubt the best among its peers was also launched and this was followed by the company’s table water, Mowa, as well as its carbonated soft drink, Kally. With all these products in high demand in the country, it is believed that the company should be self-sustaining; but the news filtering out of the company is that the once-thriving company may soon be announced to be bankrupt. This is because of a recent market survey that showed the products of the company are recently hardly seen in the market these days. This may not be unconnected with several reports of breach of the trust of its distributors who used to make up-front payments for the products only to be disappointed when the company could not supply them. This in turn has forced distributors who are still willing to make purchase to resort to a cash-and-carry system of transaction.
Global News reliably gathered that the fortune change of the company might be direct fallout of terrible management policy of the Harvard University-trained chairman/CEO of the company Mr Sanni Dangote, whose decision to burden the profit of the company in his quest to rival his elder brother’s Dangote Group. This he does by forming other companies that he runs with the funds of Dansa. Unconfirmed sources revealed that he has been securing loans from financial institutions in the name of Dansa only for him to divert such money to other businesses while the loans are being serviced by Dansa every month. This has led the banks to freeze the company’s operational money, which in turn has been making it extremely difficult for the company to operate profitably of late.
Sources revealed that the present condition of things in the company has forced it to lose some of its top management staff to other companies when the company started owing them salaries and also found it difficult to manufacture its products to full capacity owing to the fact that the banks which it is owing debits any amount paid into the account immediately it is deposited. One source specifically revealed that the billionaire elder brother of Dansa Foods owner, Aliko, had at a time assisted his younger brother with some amount that ran into a couple of billions, only for Sanni to divert the amount into other businesses believing Dansa Foods had the capacity to take itself out of the financial doldrums it was forced into by his odd business management style.
According to a former staff of the company, it is only a matter of time before the company is declared bankrupt due to the unprofessional practices of its CEO. While dismissing the fact that the company is an arm of the Dangote Group, the former staff explained that Dangote’s sales trucks and cars cannot be found to be so unkempt as the ones that the sales representatives of the company are currently working with and that it will be impossible for Dangote Group’s products to be off-shelve for any reason.