Nigerians have taken to social media to drag President Muhammadu Buhari after grocery retailer, Shoprite, announced its exiting the country after 15 years.
According to News24, the Cape Town-based retailer has started a formal process to consider the potential sale of all or a majority stake in its supermarkets in Nigeria, it said in a trading statement for the 52 weeks to end June released on Monday.
In the statement, Shoprite said the results for the year do not reflect any of their operations is Nigeria as it will be classified as discontinued operation.
International supermarkets (excluding Nigeria) contributed 11.6% to group sales, and reported 1.4% decline in sales from 2018.
South African operations contributed 78% of overall sales and saw 8.7% rise for the year.
As a result of lockdown, customer visits declined 7.4% but the average basket spend increased by 18.4%.
See some reactions from Nigerians below…
“Mr Price has closed shop and left Nigeria. Apparently Shoprite too is closing its operations and leaving Nigeria after selling its stakes. Very soon multichoice and MTN might also leave. Buhari is really doing a great job and Nigerians are lucky to have him as President.”
“Almost a dozen big multinational companies have left Nigeria between 2015 and today, due to Buhari’s anti-Business policies. I mean, Nigeria is still rising very high on the “Ease of doing business” global ranking but Businesses keep closing down in the real Nigeria.”
“As these Businesses are closing up, thousands of jobs get lost, unemployment rate rises. But I think we should take comfort in the fact that Buhari has set up employment schemes like N-power to tackle unemployment. 30K pere to hold body. The benevolence.”
“Mr Price actually left to refocus their business and concentrate it in SA MTN should be grateful to Nigeria for even allowing them to List after that their shameful scandal. Buhari might not have gotten his business policy right but this corporate news are not his fault.”
“Africa’s biggest grocery retailer, Shoprite, is exiting the continent’s most populated country, Nigeria, after 15 years The SA retailers have struggled in the Nigeria market & most recently Mr Price also exited Nigeria Is there ease of doing business in Nig? Job loss again.”
