Gtext group targets NSE listing in five years

Trading floor of NSE, Lagos

By Benjamin Alade
Gtext global, a conglomerate of companies has indicated interest to get listed at the Nigerian Stock Exchange as part of its expansion plans to global market in the next five years. The Chief Executive Officer of the
group, Stephen Akintayo, disclosed this at a media conference to celebrate its 10 years anniversary in Lagos on Wednesday.
Akintayo said the group is registered as a company in the United States of America, United Kingdom and the Middle East, with interests in printing, real estate, agriculture and several other sectors.
Speaking on the journey thus far, he said: “Our story is that of a thriving entrepreneur. It is not easy to have grown organically without a godfather. It’s been a real journey of hard work, dogged commitment of not giving up.“Why we are celebrating is because we need to encourage entrepreneurs in Africa, we need to encourage Nigerians to start a business. At the moment we have conservative data of about four million unemployed and underemployed,” he added.
Akintayo said the private sector needs to provide jobs and employment, stating that until we have more people go into businesses having more entrepreneurs evolving, there is no way that Africa particularly Nigeria can become the great economy that we desire.He revealed that the group has raised entrepreneurs across Africa in their hundreds and thousands; training over three million people online, while over hundred people in different opportunity entrepreneurship skills have been trained physically.
In his words: “I think if Dangote has been doing a lot of empowerment training, would have probably have a lot of manufacturing companies in Nigeria and our unemployment would have reduced. For the future, we want to take certain sectors by the horn particularly sectors that has the potential of creating jobs.”
“One of the sectors we are investing in going forward is real estate; we are planning at the verge of getting brand ambassadors, which will be unveiled at the 10th year anniversary celebration because we believe it has a lot of potential.
“There is construction, building amongst others. We have trained over a thousand of people in that field with the help of one of our subsidiary companies. We are now into the ecommerce space and printing. We are investing in big sectors that can help in creating jobs and helping to employ more hands, he said.
Business Development Manager, Ikechukwu Ohanson, said the group is currently generating funds organically to create grants for the entrepreneurs who it had engaged over the years.
Ohanson said the group is currently looking at investment partners who will invest in other people’s business, stating that the group has never accessed international grant to fund its entrepreneurs.