Othman Benjelloun; Accusations against the Third Richest Man in Morocco

For many years, the billionaire Othman Benjelloun ranked second in the list of Morocco’s richest people, issued by the American magazine "Forbes" annually. Recently, the businessman holding the position of Minister of Agriculture and Fisheries, Aziz Akhannouch, began competing with him for the second position.

The latter managed to take the second position in the Forbes list for the year 2020 and the 15th among the richest businessmen in Africa, with a fortune of 1.7 billion dollars, while Ben Jelloun fell to the third in Morocco and 17th in Africa, with a fortune of up to 1.4 billion dollars. 

So let’s introduce the third richest Person in Morocco!

Within the Royal Palace

Al-Khali' ben Talib benjelloun, Othman's grandfather, was close to the Sultan in the 17th century. The same thing was repeated in the 20th century when Hassan II appointed Othman ben Jelloun as his financial advisor.

In 1999 - the first year of King Mohammed VI's accession to the throne - Ben Jelloun became the largest shareholder in the "ONA" holding group, owned by the royal family in Morocco and which is a group of companies investing in different sectors.

Ben Jelloun was awarded the Throne medal with the rank of officer in 2010 from King Mohammed during the celebrations commemorating his accession to the throne.

Othman Benjelloun appears in most of the economic activities attended by the king, as he is constantly a member of the delegation accompanying him. Particularly with the projects launched by the Moroccan monarch in African countries, where the activity of the economic group ONA boosts through banking agencies and social projects.

Othman Ben Jelloun is less likely to appear or communicate with the press. During the years when the list of the richests has been published in Morocco, the man did not appear in dialogues with the Moroccan press, except with a few statements on rare occasions.

In 2018, he confirmed that his group is not for sale, commenting on news circulating about the control of the Bank by the Minister of Industry, Trade, Investment, and Economy in the Benkirane government, and one of the prominent businessmen in Morocco, Hafeez Elalamy.

Business First

Othman Benjelloun declaratıon did not intend only to correct the information, but rather uncovered a hidden conflict between him and El Alami. The CEO of the “Bank of Africa” accused the minister of selling one of his companies to another in South Africa that does not support the Moroccan Sahara at the United Nations.

For its part, Moroccan newspapers accused Ben Jelloun of dealing with "the enemies of Morocco" in 2018, when he decided to open 5 branches of his bank in African countries, including South Africa and Zimbabwe, which support the Polisario (Morocco considers it separatist).

The press reported another meeting in 2007 that brought Ben Jelloun together with the Algerian Prime Minister - at the time - Abdelaziz Belkhadem, in Algeria, in his position as head of the Union of Maghreb Banks, to demand the opening of a branch of his bank in the eastern neighbor that supports the Polisario Front in its conflict over the Sahara with Morocco. The press even described him as "giving priority to business at the expense of Rabat's interests."

Morocco and Africa

Othman was born rich in 1932 in the city of Fez (in which the most prestigious families of Morocco lived), where his father owned a textile company (factory), while his grandfather was the largest merchant of Fez, and the most prominent importer of tea from China to Morocco.

Away from the field of commerce, Ben Jelloun decided to fulfill his desire to become an architect, after obtaining his high school diploma from the "High School of Lyautey" - a school for the French mission in the city of Casablanca bearing the name of the former French Resident-General in Morocco - to travel to Lausanne, Switzerland.

Othman's ambition was the opposite of his brother Omar, whose commercial sense led him to become like his great-grandfather, Al-Khali' bin Talib ben Jelloun, who was close to the sultans of the kingdom, and was even considered the "black box" of the kings of the Alawite state in the eighteenth century.

The young man returned to Morocco and began to make his fortune from his activities in the field of banking and insurance. In 1989, Ben Jelloun bought the heirs’ shares in the Royal Insurance Company. Although it was not one of the major insurance companies, it had a symbolic and historical importance for the financial sector in Morocco. It was established in 1949.

Attributing the name of monarchy to the company at that time constituted a challenge to the colonial authorities and a tribute to the role of King Mohammed V in his leadership of the battle to liberate the country.

Today, Benjelloun is the CEO of the Moroccan Bank of Foreign Trade, which has a presence in more than 20 African countries. In 2015 it was called the "Moroccan Bank of Foreign Trade for Africa", and at the beginning of 2020 the "Bank of Africa".

The man aspires to make his bank leader in Africa by expanding his network at the banking and insurance level, to include all African countries, after it became one of the 3 most important Moroccan banks.

His Journey In Business

The Moroccan Bank for Foreign Trade was established in 1959, and it was the first bank to have a branch abroad by opening an office in Paris in 1973, and it was listed on the Casablanca Stock Exchange in 1975, before being transferred to the “Finance” holding - Owned by Ben Jelloun - in 1995, when Ben Jelloun managed to Winning the deal to privatize the bank, and began transforming it from a public financial institution specialized in financing foreign trade into a bank with multiple activities, banking and semi-banking professions.

To achieve this, Ben Jelloun carried out an unprecedented financial operation in Morocco in 1996, as the bank was the first private Moroccan institution to issue international deposit bonds priced on the London Stock Exchange, with the aim of increasing the bank's capital financing by $60 million.

The billionaire is considered one of the most important businessmen in Morocco, as he heads the economic group "Finance", which monitors about 25% of the insurance market in Morocco through the "National Insurance Company" and the "Royal Insurance Company", which were later merged under the name "Royal National Insurance", in addition to being the head of the "Professional Group of Moroccan Banks" since 1995.

Ben Jelloun's wealth increased in 1999 when he added to his properties, the National Insurance Company and the African Insurance Association, owned by the French National Insurance group. The deal was financed by an international loan of $160 million co-financed by about 25 founders.

The billionaire's business was not limited to banking and insurance, but also extended to the communications sector, tourism, agriculture, air and land transport, and the media field as well.