{"id":4804,"date":"2018-10-11T19:26:01","date_gmt":"2018-10-11T15:26:01","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.uaebarq.ae\/en\/?p=4804"},"modified":"2018-10-11T19:26:01","modified_gmt":"2018-10-11T15:26:01","slug":"africas-youngest-billionaire-kidnapped-by-gunmen-from-luxury-hotel","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.uaebarq.ae\/en\/2018\/10\/11\/africas-youngest-billionaire-kidnapped-by-gunmen-from-luxury-hotel\/","title":{"rendered":"Africa&#8217;s youngest billionaire kidnapped by gunmen from luxury hotel"},"content":{"rendered":"<div class=\"el__leafmedia el__leafmedia--sourced-paragraph\">\n<p class=\"zn-body__paragraph speakable\">Gunmen have kidnapped an African billionaire from a luxury hotel in Dar es Salaam, the capital of Tanzania, police told CNN.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<div class=\"zn-body__paragraph speakable\">Mohammed Dewji, 43, was taken by the men who waylaid him as he left the hotel gym after his early morning workout at around 6.30 am local time, police said.<\/div>\n<div class=\"zn-body__paragraph speakable\">The abductors, who are believed to be foreign nationals, accessed the gym through gates that are believed to have been left open deliberately, Dar es Salaam regional police commissioner Lazaro Mambosaso told CNN.<\/div>\n<div class=\"zn-body__paragraph\">They drove into the hotel and opened fire before bundling Dewji into a car and speeding off, said Dar es Salaam regional police commissioner Lazaro Mambosaso.<\/div>\n<div><\/div>\n<div>\n<div class=\"zn-body__paragraph\">&#8220;They came in a car to the hotel and started shooting in the air before they took him away. We are questioning the staff who were on duty at the time,&#8221; the commissioner said.<\/div>\n<div class=\"zn-body__read-all\">\n<div class=\"zn-body__paragraph\">The motive for the kidnapping is still unknown, although police expect this to be a &#8220;ransom&#8221; kidnapping.<\/div>\n<div class=\"zn-body__paragraph\">Reports about Dewji being found are false &#8212; police have been deployed to discover his whereabouts, according to Mambosaso.<\/div>\n<div class=\"zn-body__paragraph\">Dewji is\u00a0Africa&#8217;s youngest billionaire\u00a0and runs the METL group, a family business founded by his father in the 1970s, that operates across six African countries.<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<div><\/div>\n<div class=\"zn-body__read-all\">\n<div class=\"el__embedded el__embedded--standard\">\n<div class=\"el__video--standard js__video--standard\" data-autoplay=\"false\">\n<div class=\"zn-body__paragraph\">The pan-African conglomerate has massive holdings in textile and food and beverage manufacturing businesses across Africa.<\/div>\n<div class=\"zn-body__paragraph\">Dewji popularly called Mo, launched a beverage brand called\u00a0Mo Cola to compete with Coca Cola\u00a0in 2014.<\/div>\n<div class=\"zn-body__paragraph\">According to Forbes Magazine has a net worth of $1.5 billion making him Africa&#8217;s youngest billionaire.<\/div>\n<div class=\"zn-body__paragraph\">In 2016, Dewji signed\u00a0The Giving Pledge\u00a0in 2016 and promised to donate at least half his fortune to philanthropic causes.<\/div>\n<div class=\"zn-body__paragraph\">He served two terms in the Tanzania parliament before he resigned in 2015 to dedicate more time to the family business.<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<p>&#8211;<\/p>\n<p>CNN<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Gunmen have kidnapped an African billionaire from a luxury hotel in Dar es Salaam, the capital of Tanzania, police told CNN. Mohammed Dewji, 43, was taken by the men who waylaid him as he left the hotel gym after his early morning workout at around 6.30 am local time, police said. The abductors, who are &hellip;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":4805,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-4804","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","","category-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.uaebarq.ae\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4804","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.uaebarq.ae\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.uaebarq.ae\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.uaebarq.ae\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.uaebarq.ae\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4804"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.uaebarq.ae\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4804\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4806,"href":"https:\/\/www.uaebarq.ae\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4804\/revisions\/4806"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.uaebarq.ae\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/4805"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.uaebarq.ae\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4804"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.uaebarq.ae\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4804"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.uaebarq.ae\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4804"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}