Team size: 60+

Jurisdictions your role covers: Jurisdictions that I oversee as part of KFH Group’s overall reach include Kuwait, Turkey, KSA, Egypt, UK, Bahrain, Germany, UAE and Iraq. We further directly oversee one-off matters in other jurisdictions, such as the USA.

What are the major cases or transactions you have been involved in recently?

My in-house legal team and I led the legal due diligence of Kuwait’s largest acquisition project and successfully accomplished the completion of one of the most legally complicated acquisitions I have encountered. We further successfully completed the merger procedures of AUB, overcoming all legal obstacles faced by the working groups. In terms of mega financing projects, we made numerous mega finance deals in various financial vehicles, which involved mega sukuk offerings in the UK market. We also played major roles in the legal for other financing tools to mega financing deals, such as the Limaak syndicated facility and numerous others.

As for litigations, as the Chief Legal Officer, I take pride in the fact that almost all major litigations are delt with and handled in-house and under my direct supervision. We have proven to be extremely successful and market leaders in this field.

How do you approach managing legal aspects during periods of instability or crises, and how does your legal strategy align with the broader business strategy to ensure the organisation’s resilience?

We have put in place a market-leading Business Continuity plan that has gone through various simulation-style scenarios and was put to the test during the Covid lockdown period. It proved its robustness and that efficacy when Legal successfully managed to unfreeze cash that was wrongfully withheld by the authority due to a false flag-like complaint in a record time.

KFH Group Legal provides legal support and services to KFH Group by harnessing the legal, technical and practical expertise of its members, as well as outstanding legal and technical performance, and making every effort to preserve the rights of KFH and subsidiaries in the jurisdictions in which KFH Group operates.

What emerging technologies do you see as having the most significant impact on the legal profession in the near future, and how do you stay updated on these developments?

AI definitely will affect the legal profession, with emerging new service providers of AI. New legal specialities will appear, such as AI and updated data privacy law.

How does your team contribute to the overall business strategy of the company? Can you share an example of a recent legal-led initiative that had a significant impact?

Group Legal conducts internal administrative investigations, reviews contracts, provides legal opinions and advice, distributes estates related to the accounts of the deceased to their heirs, handles legal correspondences with official authorities – including responding to the Public Prosecution and investigation authorities. Group Legal also attends investigation sessions on a daily basis before various investigation authorities, responding to inquiries from the Expert Directorate of the Ministry of Justice and from judicial authorities. It represents KFH in the Legal Advisors Committee of the Kuwait Banking Association, providing legal opinions, studies and research on the issues raised, and providing proposals and observations on draft laws and regulations related to the banking activity.