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African Bank CEO

African Bank CEO

African Bank Holdings Limited has appointed the first black woman to head a commercial bank in South Africa.



Basani Maluleke’s appointment as chief executive officer of African Bank will be effective as of April 1.

Her appointment follows the announcement of the retirement of Brent Riley, who steps down as CEO on March 31.

Maluleke has been part of African Bank as a non-executive for over ten years. She took over as group executive for operations in 2017.

Basani’s appointment comes at a time when we are gearing up to launch our new banking product, My World, later this year. My World is an innovative new banking product which will shake up South Africa’s banking scene and we can think of no one better to help us bring this product to market than Basani.

Basani has a B Com LLB (UCT), MBA (Kellogg) and is an admitted attorney. She has over 10 years’ financial services working experience and has also worked for Edward Nathan Friedland, FirstRand’s RMB division as well as in various FNB divisions. More recently, she was an executive director of Transcend Capital, a corporate finance business specialising in B-BBEE ownership.



Speaking about her upbringing, Basani says, “We get to where we are in life because of everyone who has supported us. I was lucky enough to be educated and have been exposed to some of society’s great leaders who had a vision for themselves and the country and had empathy for those less fortunate. They understood what ubuntu really means.”

Basani’s main objective is to not only re-build the Bank to sustainable profitability but to also maintain and improve the relationship with our existing customers and develop long-lasting relationships with new customers.



In the short time Basani has been our CEO, she has seen her new role give hope to many other women. “The excitement of ordinary South Africans has been mind-blowing. It’s indicative of the general hope and excitement and optimism of the country right now. It shows that people are ready to work closely together to grow the economy and bring about transformation.”