By Bassey Udo
The new President and Chairman Board of Directors of Afreximbank, George Elombi, assumed office last Saturday with an agenda to facilitate Africa’s transformation Africa during his tenure.
Dr. Elombi, a Camerounian by birthday, was appointed the fourth President of the Bank since its establishment in 1993 following a unanimous vote by shareholders during the 32nd annual general meeting of the bànk in Abuja last June.
He is taking over from Prof. Benedict Oramah, who served in that capacity since 2015, till he stepped down in September 2025.
In his inaugural address shortly after taking his oath of office, Elombi said the bank has no agenda to continue financing the export of Africa’s raw natural resources, rather to spearhead the transformation of the continent’s produce, build regional value chains, and foster homegrown industries, to create jobs, retain wealth, and drive growth across the continent.
“I know you will be sending text messages, calling our colleagues in the regional offices for financing. Let’s be clear, if you are calling them so that we go and mine our soils, send our young men deep into the mine so that we export the gold raw, manganese raw, the coltan raw, in the next five to 10 years, we are not interested in those,” he said.
He unveiled plans by the bank to establish a Strategic Minerals Development Programme to finance entire value chains, from extraction and refining to manufacturing finished products.
“Instead of simply exporting raw lithium from the Democratic Republic of Congo, for instance, we will finance factories to produce lithium-ion batteries locally, capturing much more value here at home and creating high-skilled jobs for our people,” Elombi declared.
“Instead of exporting raw bauxite from Guinea, Nigeria, Gabon, Cameroon, or South Africa, we will focus on domestic processing,” he added.
Also, he said Afreximbank under his leadership would focus on deepening intra-African trade and regional integration to create value addition, describing the African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA) as representing a vital platform for advancing value addition and export manufacturing in the continent.
Afreximbank, he said, would intensify efforts to remove trade barriers, strengthen cross-border infrastructure development, and foster the movement of goods, services, people and capital across the continent.
Acknowledging dilapidated infrastructure network of roads and railways to ports, and power grids as major impediments to intra-African trade and a significant driver of the high logistics costs in trade in the continent, Elombi said Afreximbank would pay more attention to catalysing and building critical trade-enabling infrastructure across Africa.
“We will accelerate investments in critical trade-enabling infrastructure projects that directly facilitate trade and connect African markets. This includes not just highways and rail lines, but also modernised seaports, expanded warehousing and inland container depots, renewable energy projects, and specialised logistics hubs and energy pipelines,” he assured.
Under his leadership, he said the Bank would prioritise the creation of a shared integrated infrastructure ecosystem for trade, to take advantage of existing trade-enabling infrastructure capacity cost-effectively.
“Instead of each country building from scratch, we will catalyse the expansion of infrastructure in countries with ample capacity to serve neighbouring nations that lack the resources to develop such facilities independently. This collaborative approach ensures that all countries, regardless of their current capacity, benefit from improved market access, enhanced connectivity, and lower trade costs,” he said.
Besides, the new Afreximbank President said part of his agenda would be to utilise innovation and digital technology as potent forces for change in Africa’s economic landscape to overcome persistent developmental challenges, remove trade barriers, boost efficiency, and create new opportunities for rapid growth.
In addition, he said he would elevate artificial intelligence as a priority to realise its potentials in intra-African trade and regional integration, promote value-addition, industrial parks and smart manufacturing, create economic opportunities and growth, and enhance internal operations and efficiency.
To strengthen financial integration and innovation across Africa, to ensure true ownership of the continent’s economic destiny in the digital age, Elombi proposed the creation of a pan-African digital currency, including a Stablecoin, as a medium of exchange for transactions.
Other parts of his agenda included the plan by the bank to focus on mobilising Global African capital to work for Global African development.
Lamenting the misuse of African sovereign wealth funds, whether held by the diaspora, businesses, or governments without proper investments in other parts of the world, Elombi said Afreximbank would intensify efforts to mobilise the vast pool of capital from sovereign wealth funds, pension funds, diaspora investors, or private equity back to Africa’s growth.
Afreximbank, he pointed out, would create innovative financial instruments, trusted co-investment platforms, and a pipeline of bankable African projects that would allow African capital to flow into African opportunities.
On the ambition of the shareholders to grow Afreximbank’s balance sheet to about $250 billion in the next decade, Elombi challenged member-countries to aspire to exceed the target by raising it to about $350 billion.
He expressed confidence that the growth of the bank would be realised by focussing on export processing and industrialization, which he described as the engines of wealth creation and value addition.
“When we invest in processing, we add value; when we add value, we create wealth, and when we create wealth, we expand our capacity to reinvest. A growing base of retained earnings strengthens our balance sheet, enabling us to disburse more funds for high-impact projects, which in turn generate wealth and drive further growth,” he said.
Other parts of the agenda said that the bank would explore ways to grow the capital base that include new shareholder equity, retained earnings, co-lending frameworks, and asset management “to multiply the resources we can bring to Africa”, but keep an eye on the bank’s stability and creditworthiness.
To promote intra-Africa cooperation, Elombi said Afreximbank would collaborate with like-minded development finance institutions to build a cohesive African financial ecosystem capable of delivering large-scale, cross-border solutions to Africa.
A profile
Elombi has been with Afreximbank since 1996, after joining as a Legal Officer. He rose through the ranks to become Executive Vice President, Governance, Legal and Corporate Services.
Over his nearly three decades at the Bank, he served as Director and Executive Secretary (2010–2015); Deputy Director, Legal Services / Executive Secretary (2008–2010); Chief Legal Officer (2003–2008); and Senior Legal Officer (2001–2003).
Prior to joining Afreximbank, he taught law at the University of Hull, United Kingdom. Dr. Elombi played a pivotal role in establishing Afreximbank group’s structure, including the formation of key subsidiaries that have expanded the Bank’s capacity to deliver on its mandate.
As Chair of the Emergency Response Committee, he led the Bank’s response to the COVID-19 crisis, mobilising over $2 billion for vaccine acquisition and deployment across African and Caribbean nations. Under his supervision of the Equity Mobilisation and Investor Relations department, the Bank’s total ordinary equity mobilised amounted to USD 3.6 billion as at April 2025.
He holds a Master of Laws (LL.M.) from the London School of Economics, University of London, and a Ph.D. in commercial arbitration from the same university. He obtained a ‘Maitrise-en-Droit’ from the University of Yaoundé in 1989.
