Prudential announces a new leadership team to drive growth in East and Central Africa

To drive growth in East and Central Africa, Prudential today announced key leadership appointments.

The region which covers Uganda, Kenya & Zambia, is led by Mr. Arjun Mallik who was formerly the CEO of Prudential Uganda. Under his leadership, Prudential has become a well-recognised brand in Uganda and the fastest-growing life and health insurer for the last five years^[1]. Most recently, it was named the ‘Most Innovative Life Insurer’ in Uganda by the Insurance Regulatory Authority of Uganda.

Additionally, Gwen Kinisu has been appointed CEO of Prudential Life Assurance Kenya (PLAK), an anchor market for Eastern and Central Africa and will report to Arjun. She takes over from Raxit Soni who presided over a period of growth for PLAK and a series of impactful community activities. He assumes the role of Chief Actuary, Prudential Africa. Raxit joined PLAK seven years ago as the Head of Risk & Compliance. Gwen has over 14 years of experience in insurance and banking. She was the Chief Commercial Officer for PLAK since 2018 and during her tenure drove continued growth in the business and built strong relationships with banks, brokers and other partners.

Wilf Blackburn, Regional CEO, Insurance Growth Markets, Prudential Corporation Asia said that the new appointments are part of the insurer’s commitment to develop talents to accelerate growth for its African business.

“Prudential has laid a solid foundation in Africa over the past seven years and will continue to scale its operations and strengthen local capabilities to deliver on its growth strategy. Core to our commitment is the investment we are making in the development and advancement of our people. Our Africa leadership team demonstrates the opportunities we are creating and will continue to create for our talents in the continent.”

East and Central Africa is one of four sub-regions in the continent that Prudential has a presence and interest in. The other regions are Francophone Africa, Western and Southern Africa and Northern Africa.

Prudential established its first office in the region seven years ago. Today, it serves over 1.3 million customers, and has a strong distribution network of more than 13,000 agents and over 600 bank branches across 8 countries, namely Ghana, Kenya, Uganda, Zambia, Nigeria, Cote d’ Ivoire, Cameroon and Togo.