Equity Group names Victoria Cherotich company secretary as Lydia Ndirangu moves to tax role

Get breaking business news on WhatsApp

Equity Group Holdings has appointed Victoria Cherotich as its group company secretary, after the Central Bank of Kenya (CBK) approved the change at one of the country’s largest lenders.

She replaces Lydia Ndirangu, who has held the company secretary job alongside the group tax portfolio. Ndirangu now takes up a new role as Group Chief Tax, Regulatory Affairs and Sustainability Officer.

Group chairman Prof Isaac Macharia announced the changes in a board statement dated October 16. The notice was also published on the Uganda Securities Exchange, one of the markets where Equity is cross-listed.

“Victoria is an accomplished governance and finance professional with over 15 years of experience in company secretarial services, securities registration, governance advisory and regulatory compliance,” the board said. It also thanked Ndirangu “for her distinguished service”.

From registry clerk to company secretary

Cherotich is already an insider. She joined Equity in November 2024 as Group Registrar General, a post that covered corporate governance, the share registry and strategic human resource governance. At the group’s 22nd annual general meeting she was listed as Group Director, Governance and Strategic HR.

Before that, she spent almost two decades at Image Registrars Limited, one of the main share registrars serving companies listed on the Nairobi Securities Exchange (NSE). She joined the firm in 2006 as a registry clerk, rose through operations to become Director of Operations, and was appointed chief executive on April 1, 2023.

As CEO of Image Registrars she oversaw treasury operations, dividend administration, corporate actions and digital projects. She also served as company secretary for several listed firms, among them Sameer Africa.

That background matters for Equity. A share registrar keeps the record of who owns a company’s shares and handles dividend payments to them, so Cherotich arrives with long experience of the shareholder side of a listed business. Shareholders chasing old payouts can follow our guide on how to check and claim unclaimed dividends in Kenya.

Why CBK had to sign off

Under Kenya’s banking rules, senior officers and directors of licensed banks and their holding companies must be vetted and approved by the CBK before they take office. The company secretary advises the board on governance and makes sure the group meets its filing duties to regulators, including the CBK, the Capital Markets Authority and the NSE.

For Equity, those duties stretch across several markets. The group runs banking subsidiaries in Uganda, Rwanda, Tanzania, South Sudan and the Democratic Republic of Congo, and its shares trade in Nairobi, Kampala and Kigali.

A busy week for the counter

The appointment came during a weak week for Equity’s shares. According to Standard Investment Bank’s weekly market wrap, the stock fell 3.8% in the week to October 16 to close at KSh100, while accounting for 24.4% of all equity turnover on the NSE. Equity also led foreign investors’ selling during the week, as overseas funds continued to pull money out of the Nairobi bourse.

The change also comes as Kenya’s banking sector goes through ownership shifts, including South Africa’s Nedbank taking control of NCBA Group.

For professionals eyeing similar roles, company secretaries in Kenya must be certified and registered. Our guide to the Certified Secretaries course explains the path, and open governance and banking roles are listed on JobInKenya.