Cletus Ibeto

Cletus Mmadubugwu Ibeto was born on November 6th, 1952 in Nnewi, Anambra state, Nigeria. From an ordinary apprentice in a motor spare parts shop, Ibeto who is now chairman of the Ibeto Group, rose to become one of the richest billionaires in Nigeria and Africa as a whole.

Cletus Ibeto Age

Cletus Ibeto is 71 years old.

Cletus Ibeto Early Life

Like every other child whose parents knew the value of education, Cletus was enrolled in a school just like his like two elder brothers Cyril and Louis Ibeto. The young Cletus loved being educated and had dreams of finishing his education at the university level. Unknowingly to him, life was about to cut this dream short. At the age of 13, on January 22nd, 1966, the young Ibeto now in secondary school prepared himself for school as usual. He took his school box and already packed provisions, and was set to leave for school when he was informed of a change of plans. His father has decided to send him to one John Akamelu, a trader in Onitsha. He was to learn trade from him while his two brothers, Cyril and Louis continued their education.

After his begging and pleadings to be allowed to continue his education proved futile, Cletus Ibeto obeyed his father and left to Onitsha in his school uniform. As at this time in Nigeria, formal education was still considered “a thing for the weaklings” among illiterates and a thing for only “male” members of the family among those who welcome it. Only few parents allowed their female children to be educated. This his arrival in his school uniform made people who saw him arrive in his uniform cajole and call him names. Such as “schoolboy” and others. 

His master too hated his love for school so much and didn’t fail to use the whip on Ibeto whenever he sees it necessary. On one of Ibeto’s arm today, the mark of his master’s whip is still clearly visible. A mark Ibeto carries with pride like a trophy. Cletus stayed and learnt from his master everything he could about trade until the age of 17 when the civil war broke out. The war shortened his apprenticeship as he was forced to join the war. 

Cletus Ibeto Career

As at this time, the government of Alhaji Shehu Shagari being the government in power then, made a policy. This policy allowed the importation of goods into the country without an import licence. Cletus seized this opportunity to start importing goods into the country. By the time the import licence was reintroduced, he had already saved up to 3 million naira which he used to obtain an import licence.

This import licence enabled him to import 65 containers of motor spare parts. Shortly after this importation, a new government came into power that closed the borders temporarily and made it almost impossible for new import licences to be obtained. This unexpected situation turned out to be all that Ibeto needed to explode in his business. With his containers of spare parts already available in the market before the temporal shut down of borders, Ibeto became the only one who had enough goods at that time to sell.

He had customers from all over the country lining up to buy from him not minding the higher price at which he was selling. In an interview Ibeto said in two days of the arrival of those containers, he made about four million pounds. His business continued to thrive from that point that in the year 1995, Ibeto Group (his business name) built a spare parts manufacturing company and became the largest indigenous manufacturers of the same in Nigeria.

The next year 1996, October 2nd Ibeto set up another manufacturing company at Apapa Wharf and the Ibru Jetty Complex, Lagos Nigeria. This company was named Ibeto Petrochemical Industries Limited and manufactures petroleum products for sale both within and outside Nigerian markets. Today, he continues to invest in automotive parts, cement, hospitality, petrochemicals, banking and finance, real estate, and oil and gas.

 

Cletus Ibeto Personal Life

Having parted ways with his first wife and mother of his three children over irreconcilable differences, the astute businessman decided to take another plunge into the marriage institution. He got married to Augustina Ifeyinwa Okpala in December 2012. The ceremony which had all the trappings of wealth and opulence had in attendance, dignitaries from all walks of life including Nollywood artistes, Ebube Nwagbo, Chinedu Ikedieze, Osita Iheme, Monalisa Chinda among others.

Cletus Ibeto Awards

• Ibeto is a recipeient of the highly acclaimed national honour of Officer of the Order of the Niger (OON) from the Federal Republic of Nigeria.
• In 2012 he was also been decorated with the honour of the Commander of the Order of the Niger (CON).

Cletus Ibeto Net Worth

Cletus Ibeto is estimated to have a net worth of about $3.7 billion

Cletus Ibeto on Social Media