Najwa El Iraki

Najwa El Iraki is the founder & CEO of AfricaDev Consulting Ltd. She’s the Managing Director in Morocco for Opportunity Network,  a global fintech matchmaking platform.  She is also the General representative of Llyod’s of London in North and West Africa.

Prior to founding her company, Najwa was the head of business development at Casablanca Finance City Authority (CFCA), a public-private held organization dedicated to positioning Casablanca as a regional financial center and a premier gateway into African markets for multinational corporations, financial institutions and professional service firms. Najwa structured the project from its inception, contributing to the overall strategy for building a regional business and financial centre, advising institutional prospective investors and attracting close to 130 international companies.

Previously, she was Senior Manager within Mazars’ Financial Services Group in London. She was responsible for a team providing business advisory work and financial strategic planning across the banking, insurance and funds sectors. A role she took on after working within both large international investment banks (Lehman Brothers/Nomura) within their EMEA equity derivative business and a big four firm (KPMG London) advising financial institutions and corporates in various consulting areas including tax, corporate finance and restructuring.

Najwa holds a Master’s degree in Business Management and Finance from leading French and British business schools (Kedge Business School & Aston Business School). She has a leadership programme certificate from Harvard Business School. She is also a qualified Chartered Accountant, member of both international accountancy and UK tax leading professional institutes (ICAS & ATT).

She is also actively involved either as a co-founder or a member in a number of business associations and networks in Africa (CasaExpats – a business and social network for qualified English-speaking expatriates- , Africa Expert Network, Al-Sahm Women, Women in Business Network of the Africa CEO Forum etc.).

Najwa was named among the 60 most influential women in Africa in 2016 by “New African Woman Magazine” as well as Financial Advisor North Africa of the Year 2016 – Consultancy Award by the Corporate Vision Magazine based in London.

Najwa speaks fluently English, French, Arabic and intermediate Spanish.