'Africa's Youngest Billionaire'
Ashish Thakkar has been described as Africa's youngest billionaire. He started out with nothing - his family were made refugees twice, and he narrowly escaped the Rwandan genocide
Ashish Thakkar has been described as Africa's youngest billionaire. He is just 34 years old, but runs a business group that employs 11,000 people in 25 countries. He is also Chair of the United Nations Foundation's Global Entrepreneurs Council, and has created a foundation to support African entrepreneurs. But Ashish started with nothing - and spent some of his youth as a refugee.
Four generations ago his family moved from India to Africa. His parents met and married in Uganda, but were forced to flee in 1972 when President Idi Amin expelled all Asians from the country. Ashish told Matthew Bannister what happened to his family.
(Photo: Ashish Thakkar. Credit: Mara Group)
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- Wed 1 Jun 201611:06GMTBBC World Service except News Internet
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