Bahrain

Afshan Parveen Akhtar is currently the Chief Legal Counsel and Board Secretary for Bapco.

Afshan was born and raised in London, attending the London School of Economics and Political Science where she graduated with a Bachelor of Laws (LL.B.), subsequently completing a postgraduate Legal Practice Course at the University of Law, London.

On graduating Afshan joined Clifford Chance, one of the prestigious ‘magic circle’ London law firms, where she worked in the General Banking and Finance Team. Eventually progressing to Senior Associate, Afshan’s responsibilities were in global acquisition financing where she was seconded to leading investment banks and other listed corporates.

After spending eight formative years at Clifford Chance, Afshan moved to Bahrain where she joined Aluminium Bahrain (Alba) to manage their Legal and Corporate Affairs Department. Afshan reported directly to the Chairman of the Board of Directors, with responsibility for legal advice and support to the business. During Afshan’s tenure at Alba she was credited with building a high-performing legal function that went on to be short-listed as Legal Team of the Year, Middle East, by Corporate Counsel Middle East and Legal Week.

Afshan subsequently returned to the banking sector to join ABC Bank as a Senior Group Counsel. Afshan was responsible for providing legal advisory services to the bank’s management, whose operations spanned Middle East, North Africa, Europe, the Americas and Asia. Afshan provided advice on a range of legal documentation for banking transactions, corporate banking, structured finance, retail and digital banking, and Islamic banking.

From her time at ABC Bank to present, Afshan has also served on the Board of the Middle East and North Africa Chapter of the Associated of Corporate Counsel, which is a non-profit organisation provided education and training services to its membership of 45,000 lawyers in 85 countries around the world.

Following her tenure at ABC Bank, Afshan was delighted to join Bapco as Chief Legal Counsel and Board Secretary. Afshan now advises the Board of Directors and management across the breadth of the business.

Of the several areas of significant transformation now taking place within Bapco, Afshan leads the transformation of the legal function to build legal capability in-house and codify legal best legal practice. Afshan observes that the oil and gas industry is entering a period of rapid change as the sustainability agenda is developed by the sector. Afshan is proud to be able to use her experience of other sectors - especially corporate finance - to support Bapco in this journey.

Afshan holds several awards, including General Counsel for the year (2013) by Corporate Counsel Middle East General Counsel Power List Middle East (2013, 2015 and 2016) and has subsequently participated in the judging panel for the profession’s regional legal awards.

Afshan comments that Bapco is very much a national treasure of the Kingdom of Bahrain and that there is demonstrable pride amongst all those who work within the large community of Bapco.

Afshan leads on transformation of Bapco’s legal function