Africa’s capital joins race to own the next economy
By Adebomi Adekeye Esq. ACA.
For decades, one of the defining questions in African economic development has been where the money will come from. Governments have competed for foreign direct investment, entrepreneurs have travelled in search of venture capital, and development institutions have designed increasingly sophisticated mechanisms to make African opportunities more attractive to global investors.
The assumption has been understandable: Africa has enormous opportunities, but not enough capital to finance them. That assumption is beginning to look incomplete.
A more consequential question is emerging. As Africa enters a period of greater industrialisation, digitalisation and regional integration, who will own the assets that underpin its next phase of economic growth?
The question is not theoretical. In Nigeria, the proposed listing of the Dangote Petroleum Refinery is already providing an unusual glimpse into what a more mature African capital market could look like.
The refinery has secured a $1 billion underwriting programme ahead of its planned initial public offering, comprising a funded $600 million private placement and a further $400 million underwriting commitment. Advisers say the transaction has attracted interest from sovereign wealth funds, governments and institutional investors across Africa and the Caribbean.
The significance of the transaction extends beyond the refinery itself. A strategically important industrial asset that was built largely through concentrated private ownership is potentially moving towards a much broader investor base.
If the proposed listing proceeds, it could provide African pension funds, institutional investors and other long-term pools of capital with direct exposure to one of the continent’s most important industrial assets. That is an important shift in the way we should think about African capital.
The traditional narrative has been about attracting foreign investors to African assets. The emerging narrative is about whether African institutions can become meaningful owners and allocators of capital within Africa. There are already signs of that transition.
Africa50’s Infrastructure Acceleration Fund has reached approximately $330 million in commitments following a $20 million commitment from British International Investment. The fund is backed by a combination of African and international institutional investors and targets sectors including power and energy, transport and logistics, water and sanitation, and digital infrastructure.
This matters because infrastructure ownership requires a different kind of capital from the capital that finances a typical start-up. It requires investors who can tolerate longer investment horizons, understand complex risks and participate in assets that may become economically indispensable over decades rather than produce an exit within a few years. That is precisely why the development of African institutional capital matters.
Pension funds, sovereign wealth funds, insurance companies, development finance institutions and asset managers are not simply pools of money waiting to be deployed. They are potentially powerful economic actors.
Their investment decisions can determine which businesses receive capital, which infrastructure gets built, which sectors expand and ultimately who participates in the wealth created by economic growth. The global investment market is demonstrating the importance of this kind of ownership.
Some of the world’s largest institutional investors are increasingly partnering with private capital firms to access infrastructure megadeals.
Canada’s pension giant, CPP Investments, which already has almost $80 billion invested in energy and infrastructure, has begun backing funds managed by firms such as Blackstone, KKR and EQT as infrastructure transactions become too large and complex for some institutions to pursue alone.
The lesson for Africa is not that African pension funds should imitate Canadian pension funds. It is that the next stage of capital formation will increasingly depend on the ability of institutional investors to participate in sophisticated ownership structures, partnerships and investment platforms. The opportunity is enormous, but so is the responsibility.
Africa cannot simply accumulate capital. It must develop the capacity to allocate it well. That distinction is critical.
The real opportunity, therefore, is not merely to increase the amount of African capital invested in African assets. It is to build the institutional architecture that allows that capital to be deployed intelligently. This is where the conversation about ownership becomes particularly important.
Consider what Africa will need over the next two decades. It will need reliable electricity, modern logistics, telecommunications infrastructure, digital payment systems, industrial capacity, housing, healthcare infrastructure, food-processing facilities and increasingly sophisticated financial services. Many of these assets will generate long-term economic value. The question is whether African investors will have meaningful ownership in them.
If the answer is no, Africa could experience a paradoxical form of economic growth in which infrastructure expands, and businesses flourish, but a significant proportion of the long-term economic value created continues to accrue elsewhere.
Foreign capital will remain essential. There is no serious argument for replacing international investment with domestic capital simply for the sake of doing so. Africa needs global expertise, technology, risk-sharing capacity and access to enormous pools of international capital. But foreign capital should not be the only capital available.
A healthier investment ecosystem is one in which international and African capital can participate together, with African institutions increasingly capable of investing alongside global investors rather than simply waiting to receive them. That evolution is already visible in parts of the market.
African private capital is becoming more institutionalised, while private credit is attracting increasing interest from long-term investors. Globally, private credit fundraising remains strong, with Ares Management reporting $23.7 billion raised by its credit business in the second quarter of 2026 alone, reflecting continued institutional demand for alternative credit strategies.
Africa’s own financing needs make this development particularly significant. Businesses that cannot access traditional bank financing will increasingly require alternative forms of capital, while infrastructure and industrial projects may require financing structures that combine equity, debt, guarantees and institutional investment.
The ability to structure that capital will therefore become almost as important as the availability of capital itself. This also has profound implications for African businesses.
For entrepreneurs, the question should increasingly move beyond, “How much funding can I raise?” A more mature capital market asks different questions. Who are the right long-term investors? What kind of ownership structure will allow the business to scale?
Can the company accommodate institutional capital without losing strategic flexibility? Is the business governed well enough to attract investors who will conduct serious institutional due diligence? And, perhaps most importantly, is the company building an asset that investors will still want to own ten years from now?
For investors, the challenge is equally significant. The next generation of African investment opportunities will require more than identifying attractive sectors. Investors will need to understand regulatory environments, currency exposure, governance, operational execution, political and market risk, and the increasingly complex structures through which capital can be deployed across multiple African jurisdictions.
For governments and regulators, the objective should not simply be to announce that more capital is available. The deeper task is to create markets in which capital can move efficiently, transparently and responsibly.
Stronger capital markets, credible institutions, predictable regulation and effective investor protections are not administrative details. They determine who is willing to invest, at what price and for how long.
There is also an important cultural dimension to this conversation. Africa has spent decades thinking of itself primarily as a destination for investment. The next phase of its economic development should encourage us to think of Africa as a source of capital as well. The distinction is subtle but powerful.
A continent that attracts foreign capital is participating in the global economy. A continent that can also mobilise, manage and deploy significant amounts of its own capital is beginning to shape that economy.
The most important question is therefore not whether Africa will attract enough money to finance its next economy.
It is whether African capital will be sufficiently organised, sophisticated and confident to own a meaningful part of it.
Africa’s next economic advantage may not simply be its ability to attract capital from the rest of the world. It may be its ability to mobilise the capital already within the continent, combine it intelligently with international capital and deploy both towards assets capable of creating lasting economic value.
The companies that build Africa’s next economy will matter. So will the investors who own them. And increasingly, the institutions that determine who gets to own them may matter just as much.
*Adebomi Adekeye, Co-Founder and Partner at EandC Legal, is a corporate lawyer and chartered accountant advising technology companies, investors and emerging businesses on fintech, regulation, data protection and cross-border transactions. Email: hello@uyilaw.com
