无论以何种定义来看，玛丽亚·丹格特都过着继承人的生活。她度假时乘坐父亲的私人飞机；她的儿子们在瑞士上寄宿学校；她早已知道自己最终将继承如今总计数百亿美元的财富。
By just about any definition, Mariya Dangote has led the life of an heiress. She uses her father’s private jet for vacations; her sons went to boarding school in Switzerland; and she’s long known she’ll eventually inherit a fortune that today totals tens of billions of dollars.
然而，当她想要攻读MBA时，这一切都无济于事。为了读MBA，这位尼日利亚女继承人需要得到丈夫的许可。丹格特坐在父亲那栋大理石外墙的豪宅的五间客厅之一里说道：“在我的文化中，女性就应该做家庭主妇，照顾孩子和丈夫。”她头上戴着一条芥末黄色的雪纺头巾。
Yet none of that mattered when she wanted to get an MBA. To do that, the Nigerian heiress needed her husband’s permission. “In my culture, women are just meant to be housekeepers, taking care of kids, husbands,” Dangote says, sitting in one of five living rooms of her father’s marble-clad mansion, a mustard-yellow chiffon scarf covering her hair.
她的父亲是阿利科·丹格特，非洲首富。他掌控着一个横跨水泥、糖、化肥和能源的商业帝国，年销售额达200亿美元。这座宅邸位于维多利亚岛的中心地带，是拉各斯最令人向往的住宅地址之一，四周是砖墙，旨在确保隐私并将路人挡在远处。不过最近，丹格特在筹划非洲有史以来规模最大的首次公开募股之际，一直对外敞开了大门。
Her father is Aliko Dangote, Africa’s wealthiest man. He controls an empire spanning cement, sugar, fertilizer and energy, generating sales of $20 billion a year. The house sits in the heart of Victoria Island, among the most coveted residential addresses in Lagos, behind brick walls designed to ensure privacy and keep passersby at a distance. Lately, though, Dangote has been opening up as he plots the biggest initial public offering Africa has ever seen.
丹格特石油炼油和石化有限公司包括位于拉各斯附近的一座耗资200亿美元的加工设施，拥有自己的码头、大坝、发电站和高速公路。此次IPO将上市炼油业务约3%的股份，预计至少筹集16亿美元。他还向普通尼日利亚人提供其中的一小部分机会，他称之为“人民的IPO”，最低投资额仅为4美元。当然，这也是“丹格特的IPO”，他将控制超过80%的股份，据彭博亿万富翁指数估计，通过此次上市，他的财富可能会增加近三分之二，达到580亿美元。阿利科·丹格特拒绝就本文接受采访。
Dangote Petroleum Refinery & Petrochemicals FZE includes a $20 billion processing facility near Lagos with its own jetty, dam, power station and highway. The IPO, listing roughly 3% of the refinery business, is expected to raise at least $1.6 billion. And he’s offering ordinary Nigerians a sliver of that, with what he calls the “IPO for the people” requiring a minimum investment of only $4. It’s also, of course, an “IPO for Dangote,” who will control more than 80% of the shares and will likely see his fortune climb by almost two-thirds in the listing, to $58 billion, the Bloomberg Billionaires Index estimates. Aliko Dangote declined to be interviewed for this story.
69岁的丹格特正安排他的三个女儿接手他花费半个世纪打造的商业帝国。玛丽亚（47岁）和她的姐妹哈利玛（42岁）与法蒂玛（40岁）已在父亲的公司工作十余年，基本远离公众视线。但今年，三人均被提拔至高级领导岗位。这一变动引发了外界对丹格特帝国未来走向的猜测，以及此举可能如何突破一种文化的边界——在这种文化中，女性退居幕后要常见得多。
At 69, Dangote is positioning his three daughters to take over the business he’s spent the past half-century building. Mariya (47) and her sisters, Halima (42) and Fatima (40), have worked in their father’s companies for more than a decade, largely out of the spotlight. But this year all three have been promoted to senior leadership positions. The change has stoked speculation about what comes next for Dangote’s empire and how it might push the boundaries of a culture in which it’s far more typical for women to stay in the background.
“我们是来自北方的年轻穆斯林女性，在那里，一直工作并不是常态，”哈利玛说。法蒂玛补充说，姐妹们必须反复证明自己，“而且我们仍在向父亲证明自己。”玛丽亚比她的两个姐妹走得更远，更走出了自己的舒适区。另外两人就读于精英寄宿学校和英国的大学，而玛丽亚则留在卡诺——尼日利亚北部一座人口500万、以穆斯林为主的城市。
“We are young Muslim women from the north, where it’s not the norm to work all the time,” Halima says. The sisters, Fatima adds, must repeatedly prove themselves, “and we are still proving ourselves to our father.”Mariya has pushed further outside her comfort zone than either of her siblings. The others attended an elite boarding school and universities in the UK while Mariya remained in Kano, a predominantly Muslim city of 5 million in northern Nigeria.
她二十出头便结了婚，过着更传统的生活，也养成了与之相应的观念。尽管丈夫十多年前鼓励她攻读MBA，但她担心自己还没来得及离开尼日利亚去读研究生，丈夫就会收回许可。（他没有。）她就读于英格兰的考文垂大学，于2015年获得学位。但即便现在，在负责丹格特水泥和食品业务的商业战略时，她说自己仍面临一种文化上的预设，即女性不该当老板。“当你说些什么时，人们有时会认为你说这话是因为你觉得自己比他们优越，”她说。
She married in her early 20s, leading a more traditional life and developing the sensibilities that come with it. Although her husband encouraged her to get an MBA a dozen years ago, she fretted he’d withdraw his permission before she could leave Nigeria for grad school. (He didn’t.) She attended Coventry University in England, earning her degree in 2015. But even now, overseeing commercial strategy for Dangote’s cement and food businesses, she says she faces cultural assumptions that women aren’t meant to be bosses. “When you say something, people sometimes think you’re saying it because you feel superior to them,” she says.
三姐妹都坚称，对最高职位并无真正的竞争。负责家族办公室、致力于确保跨代财富的哈利玛表示，即使其中一人最终掌管这个帝国，也不会改变她们的关系。负责集团企业传播的法蒂玛则表示，她们可能会分工负责。“我不会说我们中有人正在准备担任总裁兼首席执行官，”她说。“作为姐妹，我们希望掌控业务的不同方面。我们都有自己的优势，所以专注于我们觉得自己最擅长的领域。”
All three sisters insist there’s no real competition for the top job. Halima, who runs the family office aimed at ensuring generational wealth, says that even if one of them ends up heading the empire, it won’t change their relationship. And Fatima, who heads corporate communications for the group, suggests they might split responsibilities. “I wouldn’t say that there is one of us gearing up to be the president-CEO,” she says. “As sisters we want to have control of different aspects of the business. We all have our strengths, so we are focused on where we feel we are the strongest.”
丹格特通过生产非洲此前大多依赖进口的商品积累了财富，并从尼日利亚的进口限制中获益颇下。在他的公司控制超过60%市场份额的尼日利亚，水泥价格是印度的三倍，是肯尼亚的两倍。今年价格大幅上涨，促使尼日利亚竞争监管机构对丹格特水泥公司及另外两家规模远小的本地竞争对手可能存在的市场操纵行为展开调查。
Dangote built his fortune by producing goods that Africa had mostly imported, and he’s profited mightily from Nigerian import restrictions. Prices for cement in the country, where his company controls more than 60% of the market, are triple their level in India and double those in Kenya. A sharp rise in prices this year has prompted an investigation by Nigeria’s competition regulator into possible market manipulation by Dangote Cement Plc and two far smaller local competitors.
这些公司将涨价归因于能源和物流成本上升，以及尼日利亚货币奈拉贬值，奈拉在过去三年中对美元贬值了40%。
The companies have attributed the increase to rising energy and logistics costs and a weakening of Nigeria’s currency, the naira, which has lost 40% of its value against the US dollar in the past three years.
在炼油方面，丹格特一直推动汽油经销商在国内购买而非进口，并对其进口许可证提起诉讼。英国会计师、丹格特的长期批评者费伊·法韦欣米表示，他看到尼日利亚保护水泥制造商免受进口冲击的方式存在“不舒服的相似之处”。为了帮助控制燃油价格，他说，政府应抵制排斥外国竞争对手。“我们不应重蹈水泥行业的覆辙，当时我们完全封锁了所有人，”法韦欣米说。
In refining, Dangote has been pushing gasoline distributors to buy domestically rather than importing, and he’s filed a lawsuit challenging their import licenses. Feyi Fawehinmi, a UK accountant and longtime critic of Dangote, says he sees “uncomfortable parallels” with the way Nigeria shielded cement makers from imports. To help keep fuel prices in check, he says, the government should resist shutting out foreign rivals. “We shouldn’t repeat the same mistakes we made with cement, where we just completely blocked off everybody,” Fawehinmi says.
Mariya反驳了保护本国免受外国竞争对 Dangote 成功至关重要的说法，称该公司欢迎任何愿意在尼日利亚投资的竞争对手。她指出，在她父亲开设自己的设施之前，该国的炼油业几乎完全由国有企业控制。监管机构仍在努力解决如何监管该行业的问题，这使他面临她认为不公正的批评。“在媒体上，有些人说Aliko Dangote想要垄断该行业，但事实并非如此，”她说。
Mariya disputes the suggestion that protection from foreigners has been crucial to Dangote’s success, saying the company welcomes any competitors willing to invest in Nigeria. Refining in the country, she notes, was almost exclusively state-owned before her father opened his facility. Regulators are still grappling with how to oversee the industry, leaving him open to what she considers unfair criticism. “In the media, some people say Aliko Dangote wants to monopolize the industry, but it’s not like that,” she says.
尽管他努力保持低调，但Dangote在非洲的明星地位通常只属于运动员或娱乐明星。网络视频显示他与Afrobeats热门歌手们一起出入，超级巨星Burna Boy甚至有一首2019年的歌曲名为“Dangote”。微软公司联合创始人比尔·盖茨和早年押注非洲手机业务的英裔苏丹富豪Mo Ibrahim等亿万富翁都视他为朋友。
Despite his efforts to keep a low profile, Dangote is an African superstar in a way usually reserved for athletes or entertainers. Clips online show him hanging out with Afrobeats hitmakers, and megastar Burna Boy even has a 2019 song titled “Dangote.”Billionaires such as Microsoft Corp. co-founder Bill Gates and Mo Ibrahim, the British-Sudanese tycoon who made an early bet on cellphones in Africa, count him as a friend.
他的女儿们大多避开了这种关注。“我总是告诉爸爸，他很幸运有好女儿，”Halima说。“我们不在社交媒体上。我们不四处派对。我们不喝酒。我们没有计划过。一切都很自然。”二月，情况发生了变化，当时该公司表示将提拔姐妹俩担任关键职位，并承诺“赋能新一代承担更广泛的责任，塑造我们的未来”。这项被视为继承计划开端的公告，引起了渴望了解谁最终可能控制这个帝国的分析师和投资者的关注。
His daughters have largely avoided such attention. “I always tell my dad he’s lucky he has good girls,” Halima says. “We’re not on social media. We’re not partying around. We’re not drinking. We didn’t plan that. Everything happened organically.”Things changed in February, when the company said it was elevating the sisters to key positions, promising to “empower a new generation to take on expanded responsibilities in shaping our future.”Framed as the beginnings of a succession plan, the announcement drew interest from analysts and investors keen to know who might eventually control the empire.
这种审视只会增加。除了该炼油厂在尼日利亚的首次公开募股外，该集团的水泥部门正准备在伦敦证券交易所进行二次上市，让更广泛的投资者群体能够购买其股份，并使他们免受奈拉汇率波动的困扰。肥料部门也在准备公开募股。
The scrutiny will only grow. Aside from the refinery’s IPO in Nigeria, the conglomerate’s cement unit is preparing a secondary listing on the London Stock Exchange, giving a wider pool of investors access to its shares and sparing them the volatility that plagues the naira. The fertilizer unit is also preparing a public offering.
丹格特尽力帮助女儿们摆脱——或至少应对——即便在尼日利亚精英圈子里也把女性 relegated 到家庭领域的社会期待。哈莉玛19岁遇到一位求婚者时，他敦促她完成学业、取得硕士学位并完成一年的义务准军事服务，然后在25岁左右结婚。“我爸爸希望我丈夫看到我在工作，”哈莉玛说，她现在和那个男人育有三个女儿，那个男人是卡诺州一位前军事州长的儿子，也是电力和航空企业的高管。法蒂玛直到30岁出头才结婚；她的丈夫是一名飞行员，现在负责丹格特的基础设施和物流。
Dangote did his best to help his daughters escape, or at least contend with, the social expectations that relegate women to the domestic sphere even in Nigeria’s elite circles. When Halima met a suitor at 19, he urged her to finish school, earn a master’s degree and complete a year of mandatory paramilitary service before marrying in her mid-20s. “My dad wanted my husband to see me working,” says Halima, who now has three daughters with that man, a son of a former military governor of Kano State and an executive in power and aviation companies. Fatima didn’t marry until her early 30s; her husband, a pilot, now heads infrastructure and logistics for Dangote.
在姐妹俩所属的更为广泛、相对保守的穆斯林社区中，以这种方式获得信任仍然罕见。“很少有男人会把这种责任交给自己的女儿，”法蒂玛·瓦利-阿卜杜拉赫曼说，她也是卡诺本地人，并担任丹格特工业有限公司的董事会成员，该公司是这个企业集团的控股公司。
In the broader, relatively conservative Muslim community the sisters hail from, being trusted in this way is still rare. “There are few men that would give their daughters that kind of responsibility,” says Fatima Wali-Abdurrahman, a fellow Kano native and board member of Dangote Industries Ltd., the conglomerate’s holding company.
卡诺历史学家易卜拉欣·阿多-库拉瓦著有关于这个古老贸易枢纽的三本书，他说，这很可能是因为丹格特来自数代充满活力的女性家族。他指出，丹格特的家族有着赋予女儿权力的悠久传统。“他的母亲是一位坚强的女性，他的姑祖母是一位坚强的女性，他的继祖母也是一位坚强的女性，”阿多-库拉瓦说。“她们在卡诺商界都很有影响力。”
That’s likely because Dangote comes from multiple generations of dynamic women, says Ibrahim Ado-Kurawa, a historian in Kano who’s authored three books on the ancient trading hub. Dangote’s family, he notes, has a long tradition of empowering its daughters. “His mother was a strong woman, his great-aunt was a strong woman, and his step-grandmother was a strong woman,” Ado-Kurawa says. “They were all influential in the Kano business community.”
丹格特第二次离婚——与哈莉玛和法蒂玛的母亲——之后，祖母成了三个女孩的主要照顾者。她在一个大家庭中抚养她们，家中还包括家里司机和女佣的孩子，她对所有人一视同仁。“她教会我们女性可以多么强大，”哈莉玛说。“我父亲也发挥了作用，但他是从母亲那里继承了这个理念。”
After Dangote’s second divorce, from Halima and Fatima’s mother, their grandmother became the primary caregiver for the three girls. She raised them in a household that included extended family as well as the children of the family’s drivers and maids, treating everyone equally. “She taught us how powerful a woman can be,” Halima says. “My dad also played a role, but he inherited the idea from his mother.”
姐妹们依然亲密，会带着各自家人一起度假，但每人都有自己的领域。哈莉玛住在迪拜，在那里管理一支为家族办公室工作的财务和法律顾问团队。玛丽亚完成MBA后一直住在拉各斯，负责监督糖、盐和水泥业务的各个方面。法蒂玛是一名律师，曾在尼日利亚一家顶级公司工作，2012年加入父亲的企业，现担任通讯主管，并负责化肥和能源销售，同样在拉各斯办公。
The sisters remain close, vacationing together with their families, but each has her own domain. Halima lives in Dubai, where she manages a team of financial and legal advisers working for the family office. Since finishing her MBA, Mariya has lived in Lagos, where she oversees various aspects of the sugar, salt and cement businesses. Fatima, an attorney who worked at one of Nigeria’s top firms, joined her father’s business in 2012, now serving as communications chief and heading fertilizer and energy sales, also from Lagos.
“他让我们为这份事业去打拼，这也让我们非常认真地对待这份工作，”法蒂玛说。“我们生来就是要力争最高水平。”阿里科·丹格特长期以来在他的企业集团中扮演着传奇般的角色，周游全球吸引投资者，并向监管机构施压——或与之抗争。没有迹象表明他会放慢脚步，因此任何接班人选似乎都还很遥远。丹格特对尼日利亚电视台表示，他正在关注三个女儿的表现，并期望她们中有一人有一天会接班，但玛丽亚说，“就目前而言，这并不是最高职位的接班。”
“He made us work for this, and it has made us take this job very seriously,” Fatima says. “We were built to aim for the highest level.”Aliko Dangote has long played a larger-than-life role in his conglomerate, traveling the globe to woo investors and pressuring — or battling — regulators. There’s no sign of him slowing down, so any replacement seems far off. Dangote told Nigerian TV that he’s monitoring the performance of all three daughters and that he expects one of them to take over someday, but “this isn’t, for now, a succession for the top job,” Mariya says.
按照计划，三人将承担越来越多的责任，使丹格特能够专注于炼油厂和化肥生产等较新的领域。“他不想担任所有业务的日常主席职务，”玛丽亚说。“但他没有下台的计划。”
The plan is for the three to take over increasing responsibility, allowing Dangote to focus on newer areas such as the refinery and fertilizer production. “He doesn’t want to be in day-to-day chairmanship of all the businesses,” Mariya says. “But he has no plans to step down.”