Role Overview
This position supports the Director, Financial Markets Department in providing strategic leadership and oversight of the Settlements, Accounting & Control Division, setting divisional strategy, establishing robust risk and governance frameworks and ensuring end-to-end excellence in domestic and foreign transaction processing, clearing, settlement, accounting, reconciliation and control functions in the Division.
Key Duties and Responsibilities
Strategic Responsibilities
- Provide leadership and expertise to a team in the execution of the mandates. Work closely with Heads of other business functions and Management to define forward-looking best practice strategic initiatives for the function.
- Contribute as appropriate to the performance of other functions and to the overall achievement of CBK's strategic objectives.
- Work effectively as part of the senior departmental management team to deliver on the key result areas and demonstrate competencies of the role.
Technical and Operational Responsibilities
- End-to-end oversight of domestic and foreign payments: clearing and settlement, confirmations, reconciliation, budgeting, accounting, custodial services and cash management.
- Coordinate integration and performance of core banking and financial systems: RTGS, SWIFT, ORACLE, Treasury platforms, market infrastructure (e.g., DhowCSD) and any other system necessary for proper and timely recording of transactions.
- Define and enforce internal controls, segregation of duties, and access governance across settlement, accounting, and forex custodial functions.
- Ensure timely resolution of all payment queries and investigations; supervise high-value transactions and escalations.
- Ensure that interests and redemptions are funded, processed and paid in an efficient and timely manner.
- Lead divisional financial reporting and closure; ensure accuracy of trial balances, sub-ledgers, and reconciliations for bank accounts, securities registers, FX transactions, money market, and fixed income portfolios.
- Oversee government securities operations: auction settlement, interest and redemption funding, corporate actions, and post-trade reporting.
- Establish liquidity risk practices (intraday monitoring, funding forecasts, collateral optimization) supporting monetary policy operations and reserves management.
- Strengthen cybersecurity and data integrity: message authentication, encryption, audit trails, incident response for critical payment systems.
- Ensure business continuity and disaster recovery strategies are in place, e.g., set Recovery Time Objective (RTO) targets and run failover tests.
- Drive automation/STP and analytics initiatives to improve timeliness, accuracy, and cost efficiency.
- Coordinate internal and external audits; close findings with durable remediation tracked via risk registers.
- Coordinate maintenance of customer static data such as Standing Settlement Instructions (SSIs) and master data governance.
- Lead policy, procedure, and standards development for settlements, accounting, custody, and reconciliations; maintain up-to-date manuals and SOPs.
- Coordinate the overall financial reporting function in the Financial Markets Department.
Other Responsibilities
- Coach, mentor, and develop divisional talent; run succession planning and capability uplift programs.
- Represent CBK in committees, working groups, and stakeholder forums on payment systems and market operations and other strategic initiatives.
- Any other assigned duties and responsibilities.
Qualifications and Experience
- Bachelor's Degree in Accounting, Business, Finance, Economics, Banking or similar field from a recognized institution.
- Master's Degree in Accounting, Business, Finance, Economics, Banking, or similar field, or a professional qualification in a relevant field is an added advantage.
- Membership of a relevant professional body is an added advantage.
- Clear understanding of financial markets, banking, and relevant emerging issues in statutory/regulatory requirements, foreign payments, monetary policy, government borrowing, FX management, and risk management.
- At least twelve (12) years' work experience in a relevant field including financial reporting, with at least two (2) years leading and driving Treasury Management in a reputable Bank, Financial Institution, Investment and Fund Management organization or related field.
- International working experience in financial markets institutions or multi-layered think tanks.
- Experience in managing a professional team of senior financial and market operations analysts.
- Demonstrated capacity in strategic and analytical thinking, sound policy judgment in areas of financial and capital markets as well as debt issues.
