Nafasi Ya Kazi :- Head Of Legal & Company Secretariat At Absa January 2025

Job type: Full-time

Empowering Africa’s tomorrow, together…one story at a time.

With over 100 years of rich history and strongly positioned as a local bank with regional and international expertise, a career with our family offers the opportunity to be part of this exciting growth journey, to reset our future and shape our destiny as a proudly African group.

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Job Summary

• To lead the Legal unit and providing strategic direction and focus.
• Responsible for the implementation and maintenance of bank’s legal and regulatory framework, address all elements which fall under the scope
• To support business in the effective management Legal matters and ensure the Legal Control resources are sufficient at all times, and capable to deliver on all key elements.
• To assist in the effective management of relation with key Country legal bodies and external lawyers
• To ensure that appropriate policies and procedures are in place and embedded to meet Group, legal and local regulatory requirements.
• To support the management on due diligence investigations of potential acquisitions assist it to make sensible decisions on legal aspect
• To ensure that the business has an effective program for raising awareness of relevant issues relating to legal matters and provide relevant training programs to enhance the knowledge of management and other colleagues
• To ensure the Legal related matters are well managed and monitored within acceptable level, timely and proactively advise the management on appropriate course of actions.
• To represent the bank in all legal related matters and ensure the best interest of the business is embedded in good faith.

Job Description

Main accountabilities and approximate time split

TeamLeadership:                                                   Establish a highly motivated Legal team.

• Set challenging and stretching objectives and ensure effective performance management, development and succession planning.
• Inspire and drive high performance in individuals and in the team.
• Act as a role model and drive proactive application of Absa Values throughout the team including establishment of common goals and objectives.
• Manage Performance Development (PD) for the function, ensure the performance objectives are set within the provided time lines and periodic reviews of colleagues is conducted continuously 
• Equip team leaders to deliver a high performance culture and ability to manage consequence for non-performing colleagues
• Timely reward the positive behaviours to induce and drive culture change toward business performance 
• Develop Team Members taking opportunity of both internal and external trainings as well as long term and short term assignments

Technical

• Ensure the Legal and Regulatory Risks (referred to below as ‘Legal & Regulatory’) and send a quarterly report to Director of Compliance & Legal as well as ARO Head of Legal and the Risk & Control Forum.
• Responsible to ensure that the Bank has effective Legal & Regulatory risk control frameworks and processes in accordance with the Absa Group Board Governance Standards.
• Manage the Legal Team in supporting all the business areas and functions in relation to the identified Legal risks and issues and provide services required to achieve the business and functional objectives and the overall Bank strategy.
• In particular, support Compliance Team with legal advice in relation to regulatory compliance, sanctions, financial crime and money laundering, and new laws that require the Bank to comply
• Monitor and follow up on new issued laws and amendments thereto through the Government Bookshop, Government Gazettes and the Media.
• Manage relationships with external lawyers and monitor their performance using best supplier management practices
• Support the Company Secretary in managing preparation of Board and Shareholders meetings, Board Packs and minutes, filing Annual Returns, Filing Appointments and Resignations of Directors, overall management of the Bank’s file at the Business Registration and Licensing Agency (BRELA)
• Monitor ongoing litigation and non-litigation matters and present the Legal Risk Report to the Director of Compliance and Legal, the Risk & Control Forum (RCF), Board Audit Committee and ARO Head of Legal on a quarterly basis.
• Monitor costs by tracking External and Internal spend including all invoices received from External Law firms and other sources and reconcile accounts on a monthly basis.
• Monitor costs by tracking External and Internal spend including all invoices received from External Law firms and other sources and reconcile accounts on a monthly basis.
• Manage external legal expenditure.  (get competitive prices for new instructions)
• Support and manage output of the security documentation from the Documents and Securities Team within the Legal Function
• Support management of contracts and drafting emanating from the Sourcing Team and other functions, ensure the standard contract templates are used and the basic Bank protection clauses are included such as liability clause, indemnity clause, confidentiality clause, termination clause, duration clause, Anti-Bribery & Corruption clause and governing law clause to mention but a few.
• Manage the Key Risk Indicators.
• Embed Legal Policies within the business by creating awareness through training, regular circulars as a champion for the Documentation Policy, Intellectual Property Policy, Use of Law Firms Policy, Competition Policy and Litigation Policy.
• Coordinate Training of the Business on new laws or Legal related issues through in-house Legal Team or as a value added service from the Panel Law Firm.
• Manage the Documentation Database updating the products and services within the Business.  Standard documents are then reviewed every 24 months
• Review the Panel of Law Firms once every two years and review the panel of Valuers and Insurers as and when it is called for
• Conduct Risk Control Assessments bi annually and as a risk owner, ensure remediation is done timely to address any issues from the route cause.
• Give observable and honest feedback in a timely manner.

Commercial Focus

• Acts as an ambassador in delivering against the Legal function objectives within scope of the role
• Offers proactive insight as exhibits in-depth knowledge of Absa business with specific cluster experience
• Positively adapts to change and adjusts approach to provide solutions
• Develops thorough commercial recommendations
• Delivers effectively on key business issues
• Develops strong networks across the organization to get things done.
• Exhibits ability to negotiate and influence positively to get things done
• Clear and confident communicator who tailors message according to audience.

Customer Focus

• Understanding of customers stated needs
• Offers insightful service provision in response to business issues.
• Develops professional relationships with key business areas and maintains relationships in testing situations.

Solutions Focus

• Takes ownership of problems and fixes what is not right with personal accountability for high quality outputs
• Gets involved in projects in the team and across the function to share knowledge and learn new skills alongside CPD

Team Working

• Shows enthusiasm for new ideas and contributes to implementation.
• Works with others to improve and seeks coaching/ mentoring for self
• Involves team members when developing recommendations and utilizes resource to the best effect
• Makes the team a fun place to work, supports others to make a success of the team and function and encourages collaborative working.
• Gives observable and honest feedback in a timely manner.
• Work on team and Function wide initiatives to make Absa a better place

Risk and Controls Objectives

Ensure that all activities and duties are carried out in full compliance with regulatory requirements, Absa Operational Risk Framework and internal Absa Policies and Standards

• In the event of major issues in the business unit, act as crisis coordinator and allocate tasks to the crisis teams.
• Review the risk and Legal profiles of the business unit on a regular basis and provide consultative support to the Head of Compliance & Legal on changes that are required to rebalance risk and reward where required.
• Understanding of own role in the end to end processes in which you play a part, including applicable risks and controls.
• Adhere to Absa policies and procedures applicable to own role, demonstrating sound judgment and responsible risk management.
• Keep up to date on all legal and regulatory changes and have the ability to articulate the impact to the Business, be well informed on the industry thinking.
• All mandatory training completed to deadline.

Technical skills / Competencies

• Strong legal analytical skills.
• Strong written and spoken English including legal terminology.
• Strong conversational French
• Ability to work with figures confidently and to construct and use excel spreadsheets confidently
• Positive personal impact on colleagues in a ‘winning together’ collaborative environment.
• Computer literate – comfortable user of usual office software packages

Experience, qualifications and other requirements specific to the role

• Satisfies the Regulatory criteria for an approved person.
• Lawyer qualified to practice in Tanzania
• Experience of retail and commercial banking and financial services gained in a financial institution or legal practice group, chambers or law firm in Tanzania and other common law jurisdiction
• Law degree (Tanzania or common law)
• Exposure to Compliance and Anti Money Laundering frameworks in a Financial Services context.

Knowledge and Expertise

• Law and practice of banking
• Financial Services Compliance Frameworks
• Anti-Money Laundering Frameworks, Laws and Regulations
• Retail financial services contractual drafting of terms & conditions / products terms etc.
• Commercial banking facility terms and standard security documentation
• Sourcing contractual relationships and drafting
• HR & Industrial relations practice
• Civil Litigation practice

Absa Values

Absa’s  Values and Behaviours represent the set of standards which governs the actions of all of us who work for the bank and against which the performance of every one of us in Absa are being assessed and rewarded:

• Trust
• Resourceful
• Stewardship
• Inclusive
• Courage.

Education

Bachelor Honours Degree: Law, Military Science and Security (Required)

How to Apply:

This is Full-time Job, To submit your application, please follow the link provided below.

CLICK HERE TO APPLY