AIG-IMOUKHUEDÉ HOSTS AFRICA’S NEXT GENERATION: When Young Global Leaders Came to Lagos to Learn How to Build at Scale
Exclusive to Ekocity | By Ekocity Business & Leadership Desk
What happens when some of Africa’s most promising young global leaders sit across the table from the people who have spent decades building the continent’s biggest institutions?
Last Friday, Lagos provided part of the answer at Access Tower in Victoria Island, Aigboje Aig-Imoukhuede, CFR, Chairman of Access Holdings and Coronation Group, hosted current and former members of the World Economic Forum’s Young Global Leaders community as part of the Aliko Dangote Foundation’s Africa-Diaspora Leadership Programme. The conversation was not about leadership as a title. It was about leadership as an economic responsibility.
The session, themed “Finance, Capital and the Real Economics of Building at Scale in Africa,” examined one of the continent’s most persistent problems: Africa has enormous ambition, but too often struggles to mobilise the long-term capital, infrastructure, governance and institutional capacity required to turn that ambition into globally competitive enterprises and there was perhaps no better case study than the *Dangote Refinery. The Young Global Leaders had visited the refinery before arriving at Access Tower, giving them an opportunity to see first-hand what happens when African capital, entrepreneurial ambition, engineering, logistics and long-term commitment converge around a massive industrial project for Aig-Imoukhuede, the lesson extends beyond one refinery. Africa cannot afford to produce one exceptional mega-project every generation and then wait decades for another.
The continent needs a system capable of producing them again and again. That requires deeper capital markets, stronger institutions, better governance and the mobilisation of African savings into productive investment. His message was particularly striking: “Vision attracts capital, governance protects capital and execution compounds capital.” That may well be one of the defining leadership lessons of the gathering.
FROM SUCCESS STORIES TO A REPEATABLE MODEL
Africa has produced extraordinary entrepreneurs but the bigger challenge is creating an environment where their success becomes repeatable.
Pension funds.
Insurance capital.
Sovereign wealth.
Private equity.
Development finance.
Commercial banks.
Capital markets.
These pools of capital must increasingly support African companies willing to think in decades rather than quarters. The Young Global Leaders were therefore exposed to a different definition of entrepreneurship.
Building at scale is not simply about having a brilliant idea. It is about financing it, governing it, executing it, surviving setbacks and creating institutions capable of outliving the founder.
THE NEXT GENERATION IS WATCHING
That may ultimately be the most important outcome of the programme. Young African leaders did not come to Lagos simply to hear speeches they came to see what Africa can build. From the Dangote Refinery to Access Tower, from finance to governance, the message was consistent: Africa’s future cannot be outsourced.
The continent needs leaders who can attract capital, build institutions, create jobs, develop technology and compete globally while solving African problems for Lagos, hosting such a gathering also carries significance It reinforces the city’s position not only as Nigeria’s commercial capital but as a meeting point for African capital, ideas and leadership.
The question now is what these young global leaders will do with what they have seen because the ultimate measure of a leadership programme is not the quality of its conversations It is what happens after the leaders return home and perhaps that is the real challenge Aig-Imoukhuede placed before them: Don’t simply admire what Africa has built. Learn how to build what Africa still needs.
EKOCITY BUSINESS & LEADERSHIP DESK
September 2026
Fawumi Kayode Abiodun
Political Analyst | CEO, Ekocity Media | Publisher, Ekocity Magazine and The Capitol Post
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