Pressure mounts as Absa revamps leadership

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Absa’s former interim corporate and investment bank (CIB) chief executive, Yasmin Masithela, is leaving South Africa’s third-largest bank as the group onboards a new cohort of executives to deliver its pan-African strategy.Masithela opted for early retirement at the end of June, becoming the latest executive to leave the bank following the departure of Punki Modise, head of strategy and sustainability, who left this year.Absa CEO Kenny Fihla, who joined the bank a year ago from rival Standard Bank, is pushing to grow market share through a pan-African strategy, in which the CIB franchise is expected to play a leading role.Fihla has assembled a male-dominated executive committee to achieve the bank’s ambitions, including Zaid Moola to head CIB; Sitoyo Lopokoiyit as CEO of personal and private banking, after previously leading fintech platform M-PESA Africa; and Leonard Barnard as CEO of business banking.Yasmin Masithela, managing executive for transactional banking at Absa CIB. Picture: SUPPLIED/ABSA Moola previously worked under Fihla at Standard Bank in its dominant CIB business.Absa confirmed to Business Times that Masithela had elected to take early retirement. The bank said she stepped down from her executive role on June 30 and will serve her contractual notice period on garden leave until December 31.“Yasmin has made a significant contribution to the group over a distinguished 15-year career, holding a number of senior leadership positions, including interim CEO of corporate and investment bank, managing executive: transactional banking, and group chief compliance officer. We thank Yasmin for her service and wish her well in her future endeavours,“ the bank said.Masithela, who was placed on medical leave six months into her role according to a News24 report, worked alongside Charles Russon, the former CIB CEO and current group executive for Africa regions, to deliver returns. In a call following the release of the bank’s trading update this week, Fihla told analysts and the media that the bank is bringing in new leaders to bolster its talent pool and is parting ways with people who were not delivering.Commenting on the executive reshuffle, co-portfolio manager at Mergence, Radebe Sipamla, said that “for the longest time” at Absa people were not delivering, investor expectations were not being met, performance was poor, and there was little consequence management.He said there was a misalignment between performance and outcomes, and the bank should have ranked among the top two if that were not the case.“Mediocrity has been tolerated for the longest time, and no-one has been held to account,” Sipamla said. “I think bringing in people from outside will bring a fresh perspective and will dismantle some of the toxic culture Absa has had.”Absa’s share price tanked on the JSE this week after the bank flagged in its trading statement for the six months ended June that its return on equity for 2026 would be around 15%, with lower-than-expected interest income amid a squeeze on margins in the Africa regions.Sipamla said Absa had revised its guidance downwards in the trading statement, showing that the bank had missed the mark and overpromised.“It would have been better if they were conservative when setting the targets in March. For the longest time there was a management discount in Absa. If they don’t start to deliver later this year, it will be difficult to convince the market that things are changing at Absa under Kenny.” Absa’s strategy was no longer anchored primarily in South Africa but on a pan-African basis, creating greater synergies between South Africa and the rest of the continent, Sipamla said.He said the appointment of Lopokoiyit reflected Absa’s awareness of changes in the banking landscape driven by technology and by regulation from the South African Reserve Bank and regulators in other markets, which had enabled more competitors to enter financial services.“Banking is not just going to be the way it was in the past. It is going to be, ‘What service can you provide to your clients at a lower cost?’, and technology will enable that,” he said.“Absa’s move to launch a mobile virtual network operator shows the competition with fintechs,” he added.“It is positive to bring in an outsider who will not think about banking in the same way, which has been a problem Absa has had for the longest time.”