Get, Set, Mo! $1.6 Billion And Counting

In recent years, he has dominated Africa’s rich lists as the continent’s youngest billionaire. Mohammed Dewji, the shrewd entrepreneur and CEO of MeTL Group in Tanzania, has previously been on two FORBES AFRICA covers – in 2013 and 2015. In this new decade, he is eyeing a much bigger chunk of African business.

- RENUKA METHIL

NET WORTH IN 2021: $1.6 billion

NET WORTH IN 2013: $1.3 billion

EMPLOYEES IN 2021: 34,800

EMPLOYEES IN 2013: 24,000

JUST BACK IN DUBAI AFTER A WHIRLWIND trip dropping off his 18-year-old daughter at the School of Foreign Service at his alma mater, Georgetown University in Washington DC, the 46-year-old Tanzanian businessman, known in the hallowed corridors of the continent’s elite as “Africa’s youngest billionaire”, is more emotional than jet-lagged.

“I had to let go of her, you know, but I’m going to visit DC more often,” says Mohammed Dewji.

He could be speaking for himself too. In FORBES AFRICA’s July 2013 cover, he had said he puts in 100 hours a week growing MeTL into a pan-African conglomerate.

Today, he admits to slowing down “a little bit” – after his headline-grabbing kidnapping incident in 2018 that gave him a new lease on life and made him veer towards philanthropy and impact investing a lot more than before, he says.

But this has in no way decelerated his ambitions to conquer more markets and more milestones.