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Billionaire Dewji set to share tips on maximising business opportunities
Mohammed Dewji, the chief executive officer of Mohammed Enterprises Tanzania Limited, shares a piece of fabric with President Yoweri Museveni during the business forum in Tanzania last month. COURTESY Photo
What you need to know:
Mr Mohammed Dewji is a businessman, entrepreneur, philanthropist, and former politician. He serves as the President of Mohammed Enterprises Tanzania Limited (MeTL) Group, a Tanzanian conglomerate founded by his father in the 1970s where he is the majority owner of the business.
Mr Mohammed Dewji, the chief executive officer of Tanzania’s biggest home-grown company - Mohammed Enterprises Tanzania Limited (MeTL) Group - will be the keynote speaker at this year’s Monitor Thought Leadership Forum slated for October 21 at Kampala Serena Hotel. The entrepreneur who has transformed a home grown business from $30 million to over $1.5 billion between 1999 and 2015, Prosper Magazine writes.
Mr Mohammed Dewji is a businessman, entrepreneur, philanthropist, and former politician. He serves as the President of Mohammed Enterprises Tanzania Limited (MeTL) Group, a Tanzanian conglomerate founded by his father in the 1970s where he is the majority owner of the business.
Mr Dewji is single-handedly responsible for increasing MeTL’s revenues from $30 million to over $1.5 billion between 1999 and 2015.
MeTL Group accounts for about 1.95 per cent of formal private sector employment in Tanzania.
Investments
Currently, the MeTL group has investments in textiles, energy, petroleum, agriculture, insurance, mobile telephony, transport and logistics, trading, real estate, and food and beverages (edible oils, milling, carbonated soft drinks, water).
The group is conducting business in eight countries and employs more than 28,000 people. MeTL’s operations contribute about 3.5 per cent of Tanzania’s Gross Domestic Product (GDP).
Mr Dewji served as Member of Parliament from 2005 to 2015 for his home town of Singida, after which he resigned from politics.
In 2019, Forbes magazine listed him as the 14th richest person in Africa, with an estimated net worth of $1.9 billion, also noted as the youngest billionaire on the content.
Mr Dewji was also the first Tanzanian billionaire on the cover of Forbes Africa magazine in 2013.
In addition to his many endeavors in the business arena, Mr Dewji also has demonstrated an exemplary record of contributing to the well-being of the people of his country via the Mo Dewji Foundation which he established in 2014.
The scope of his contributions covers education, health, and community development projects.
Helping society
Most recently, Mr Dewji joined the Giving Pledge – an initiative started by Warren Buffett and Bill Gates. This pledge is an effort to help address society’s most pressing problems by inviting the world’s wealthiest individuals and families to commit to giving more than half of their wealth to philanthropy either during their lifetime or upon their deaths.
Mr Dewji is the first Tanzanian and one of the few Africans that have made the pledge in this group of 150+ billionaires, some of whom include Bill Gates, Warren Buffet and Mark Zuckerberg.
Who is Mohammed Dewji?
Mohammed Dewji is a pan-African business leader, Entrepreneur, Philanthropist
• Born: 8 May 1975
• Birth Place: Singida, Tanzania
• Net-worth:$ 1.9 Billion (Forbes, January 2019)
