Nigeria Investment Gateway, a London-based investment platform, has set a target of $50bn investment push into the Nigerian economy by match-making companies with bankable project with credible funders, Femi Omotuyi, the Group Executive Director, has said.
Omotuyi spoke to BusinessDay Wednesday on the sidelines of the annual “Investment destination Nigeria” programme in Abuja, which is facilitated by his firm. He explained that companies seeking to access credible funders with their bankable projects would enjoy such access only when they met risk acceptance criteria set by the platform which it tagged “Project documentation alignment”.
He said the company had facilitated about $4bn investment inflow into Nigeria from November 2018 to July 2019 in Agriculture, Oil and gas, and mining.
On key investment targets of the firm, he disclosed that annually his company targets foreign direct investment portfolio of about $50bn into the Nigerian economy
In agriculture, he said that Nigeria Investment Gateway has a fertilizer manufacturing plant coming up in the country, and a $1.5bn solar power plant coming up, also through investment facilitation.
The company is also involved in facilitating investments in six modular refineries in the country, one with a capacity of 5000 barrels per day to be sited in Sapele, and another at the cost of $50million with a 6000 barrel-per-day refining capacity, also to be located in Delta State. Another refinery, with 120 000 barrel per day capacity, will be located in Lekki, Lagos State, he said.
Speaking further on the project documentation alignment, Omotuyi said that the funders expect to get back their money since it is not a grant. As such, he said, the investment gateway would conduct credibility test, and explained that the a project must show some credibility before the company decides to bankroll it.
“The only way we decide the credibility of a project is the credibility of the business owners, and we have the criteria for that test,” he said.
“We also focus on the bankability of the project which is that it must have the capacity to repay itself. It is a loan that is expected to be viable as such it must have the capacity to repay itself,” he noted.
Additionally, he said that a project must pass infrastructural test by demonstrating its capacity to have visible results and generate employment.
”Once the projects have passed these test, we initiate them into what really the funders want since we are working closely with them. The funders want to ply in the international market and as such the business must meet global standards and the business must be seen as one that has credibility globally,” he said.
