Botswana Life Insurance Limited (BLIL), a subsidiary of Botswana Insurance Holdings Limited (BIHL), appointed Hassam Gaffar as its new Chief Operating Officer to help the company to tighten its grip on the market.
The biggest life assurance company with assets under management topping P3 billion said in a statement on Friday that, among other assignments that Gaffar will be charged with, will be the “improvement of the company’s earning as well as to develop new business prospects” in a tightly competitive market.
Botswana Life controls 70 percent of the life assurance market and recently has embarked on a new strategy called Tsosoloso aimed at recapturing those who cancelled their policies during the economic down-turnÔÇölargely blamed on the devaluation of the pula currency ÔÇô and the new members.
Some of the products that came out of that strategy include the revamped funeral scheme, long term savings plan to beef up their life assurance policy.
“BLIL’s business is characterized by professional service standards that are delivered by motivated service teams and also by upholding the principles of financial strength, security and corporate governance,” the insurance company said in a statement.
BLIL has an extensive branch network, with the Head Office and a branch in Gaborone and other branches in Francistown, Maun, Lobatse, Palapye and Selebi Phikwe. BLIL offers a wide variety of life assurance, savings and investment products.
Gaffar is a fellow member of Chartered Association of Certified Accountants (FCCA), after being admitted into ACCA membership in 1997, he joined with PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC) and rose through the ranks to an Audit Manager.
During the 7 years post qualification with PwC, he was involved in external audits that covered the following industries, agriculture; manufacturing; donor funded projects; insurance and banking. He joined Botswana Insurance Holdings Limited (BIHL) in April 2003 as the Group Finance Manager and Company Secretary before moving to life insurance business within the Botswana Insurance Holding Limited Group to take over the role of Head of Finance (Botswana Life) in January 2004 up to August 2007.
