By Our Correspondent
Billionaire businessman Femi Otedola has revealed how Nigerian banks turned on him after he suffered a massive financial collapse in 2009 — a fall from grace that cost him over $1.2 billion.
In excerpts from his upcoming memoir titled “Making It Big: Lessons from a Life in Business,” due for release on August 18, 2025, Otedola recounts in raw detail how banks that once courted him with incentives and female marketers turned against him after a downturn in his fortunes following the 2008 global oil crash.
Otedola, who made his name in Nigeria’s energy sector through Zenon Petroleum and later acquired African Petroleum (renamed Forte Oil Plc), traced his financial woes to a diesel shipment he had ordered in 2008 when crude oil sold at $147 per barrel. Unfortunately, by the time the shipment arrived, the market had plunged to just $40 per barrel.
This price crash, coupled with a naira devaluation from N120 to N167 per dollar in 2009, delivered a crushing blow to his businesses.
“All told, I lost more than $480 million to the plunge in oil prices, $258 million through the devaluation of the naira, $320 million because of accruing interest, and another $160 million when the stocks crashed,” Otedola wrote.
What followed, he says, was a stark transformation in the attitude of financial institutions that had once wooed him with open arms.
“One moment, I was the darling of the banks, who did everything in the world to court me, do business with me, give me loans, take deposits from me. They would send bewitching ladies to make their offers more convincing, and now I was waking up to the sight of hefty, barrel-chested men standing menacingly in front of my gate, waiting for the moment I’d step out of my compound.”
The businessman described the pressure he faced during that season as relentless and traumatizing, far worse than he could have imagined.
The revelations from Otedola’s memoir provide rare insight into the fragility of wealth, the harsh realities of Nigeria’s business environment, and how quickly alliances can turn when fortunes change.
