Nigerian oil magnate, Aluko partners fashion designer, actor on $500m African development fund

At the launch of Made in Africa: Kola Aluko, Ozwald Boateng and Jamie Foxx  Picture: c/o of NASDAQ.

 
Nigerian oil magnate, Kola Aluko’s U.K-based non-profit organization, Made in Africa Foundation {MIAF} has launched a $500 million African infrastructure fund tagged Africa 50, in collaboration a British fashion designer and Ghanaian-born Oswald Boateng. 

Sources said the fund, which also involves Hollywood actor and musician, Jamie Foxx got its bell rang, officially, on Wednesday at NASDAQ in New York. 

The project, Africa50, is a Pan-African infrastructure fund, in a joint venture with the African Development Bank and Aluko’s MIAF. Media sources said the fund is designed to energise development in Africa through funding of large infrastructure projects in sub-Saharan Africa.  

Aluko said: “Infrastructure drives growth. If we focus on the big infrastructure projects- power, good roads, railways – then we will be creating an enabling environment for entrepreneurs in other areas of endeavor which are non-infrastructure”.
 

Aluko’s interest in in energy and investment banking. But the involvement of Boateng, a fashion designer and Hollywood actor Foxx suggests that the art and culture sector of Africa will not be left of the Africa 50 project.