Serge Ekue takes over as head of the West African Development Bank. This financial market specialist will soon present BOAD’s Strategic Plan. The institution will have to preserve the quality of its signature and meet the financing needs of the WAEMU.
A page turns to BOAD (West African Development Bank). After 42 years with the institution, Beninese Christian Adovelande has, as expected, given way to his compatriot Serge Ekue, appointed in mid-August to succeed him.
A change in continuity, however, since Serge Ekue was, since May 2020, special advisor to President Adovelande, in this position for nearly ten years. The adviser’s main mission was to finalize the 2021-2025 Strategic Plan, which the new president will therefore be responsible for implementing, as well as supervising the Bank’s financial resource mobilization strategies.
A handover ceremony took place on August 28, at the headquarters of BOAD in Lomé (Togo), in the presence of Sani Yaya, Minister of Finance of Togo, and current president of the Council of Ministers of WAMU (West African Monetary Union). Serge Ekue, 54, is appointed for a six-year term.
Recognized expert in capital markets, the Beninese has since 2016 managed the activities of Natixis Corporate and Investment Banking (CIB) for the United Kingdom, in London. Responsibility that he combined with that of the Market Solutions department for Europe and the MENA region (Middle East and Africa).
For Natixis, he previously advised and led the international exit operations of Benin, Senegal, and the Ivory Coast. From 2010 to 2016, he was in charge of operations for the Asia-Pacific zone for the French bank.
Serge Ekue thus has over twenty years of experience in international finance, structured finance and markets, having exercised these broad responsibilities around the world. He holds the Executive MBA from HEC Paris, a DESS in Banking and Finance from Paris V, and a diploma from the Institute of Political Studies in Bordeaux.
A few challenges, a recognized skill!
In his inauguration speech, Serge Ekue declared his intention to follow in the footsteps of his predecessors. He will be, he said, “the first person in charge of the institution, but also the first servant, its development soldier”. In his view, the success he promises for his mandate “will begin with the presentation in the coming weeks to our various governance bodies of the next Strategic Plan 2020-2025”.
The development bank, considers its ex-president Christian Adovelande, will have some challenges to meet in the coming years. The first will, in his view, be to preserve the ratios for the use of own funds, which guarantee the bank’s solvency.
Today, “the strengthening of equity is essentially due to the setting aside of annual operating results while new annual commitments are at high levels,” he explained. “With the continuation of financing activities and those of resource mobilization to ensure the necessary disbursements, a major challenge for BOAD is thus to preserve the quality of its current solvency and ratings.”
Christian Adovelande recommends, if necessary, a capital increase, the simplest solution to preserve capital adequacy, given the increasing funding requirements. There remain other challenges, one of which could soon be concluded: BOAD’s access to European Union resources, the principle of which is in the process of eligibility.
For his part, Sani Yaya recalled that “faced with the profound changes in the economic and financial environment, resulting in growing needs on the part of the Member States, BOAD’s interventions are expected from all our countries”.
The minister was referring both to the structural needs of West Africa (infrastructure, electricity, digitalization of economies, etc.) and to the challenges posed by the Covid-19 pandemic. “You are taking up your post in this period of global health and economic crisis which is not sparing our countries. Which makes this challenge even greater,” he said to the newly promoted.
He joined Serge Ekue to recall the importance of BOAD when it brings “the appropriate responses to the adverse effects of climate change, for the modernization of agriculture, the financing of the private sector, and the creation of jobs for young people, among others ”.
BOAD’s main shareholders are the WAEMU countries as well as the Central Bank of West African States. It also counts, among its second-tier shareholders, France, KFW (Germany), the EBRD (European Development Bank), the African Development Bank, Eximbank (India), Belgium, China, and Morocco.
Under the mandate of Christian Adovelande, the institution has supported more than 1,200 projects on behalf of member countries and private sector companies in WAEMU for a total amount of commitments of CFAF 5,817.8 billion (8.87 billion euros).
Reference: https://www.financialafrik.com/2020/08/29/boad-serge-ekue-et-ses-nouveaux-defis/
