A reflection on public board appointments, the burden of being politically exposed, and what we must change to make honest service worth its cost.
By Ing. Prof. Douglas Boateng, Chartered Director UK | Chartered Engineer UK | Fellow, Institute of Directors UK | Fellow, Ghana Institution of Engineering | Governance, Industrialisation and Supply Chain Strategist | Founder, Boardroom Governance Summit | Founder and Scriber, NyansaKasa (Words of Wisdom)
The Call Every Professional Dreams Of
The phone rings late one evening, and a courteous voice from the seat of government informs you that the President, wishes you to chair the board of a strategic state enterprise. By the following morning, your WhatsApp has received 237 messages, of which 230 offer heartfelt congratulations, six request employment for nephews of uncertain qualification, and one, from your bank, warmly invites you to submit updated evidence of your source of wealth. Only that last correspondent, it later emerges, fully understood what had happened. You had not merely accepted an honour; you had acquired a status, and in the language of global finance, you had become a Politically Exposed Person. Hence the spirit of this reflection: warm congratulations, and a quiet word of condolence.
What Exactly Is a Politically Exposed Person?
In plain terms, and under global standards against money laundering, a Politically Exposed Person is anyone who is or has been entrusted with a prominent public function at home, abroad or in an international organisation: heads of state, ministers, legislators, senior judges, military chiefs, party officials, and the chief executives and, in many jurisdictions, board members of state enterprises. The net extends to spouses, children, parents and close business associates. The label passes no judgement on character; it simply tells a bank that the customer’s position could, in theory, be abused. Its implications are intensely practical. Banks must obtain senior management approval before opening or continuing the relationship, establish the source of the customer’s wealth and of significant funds, and monitor the account more closely than almost any other. In everyday life, this translates into repeated paperwork, delayed or held transfers, cautious lenders and, at times, quietly closed accounts, often for the entire household, until one begins to wonder whether family trees should be filed alongside tax returns. NyansaKasa (Words of Wisdom) puts it simply: “A title may be worn for a season, but its questions are often carried for a lifetime.”
An Honour That Arrives With Strings Rather Than Ribbons
None of this belittles public service, which remains among the noblest callings any citizen can answer. Yet in much of Africa the arithmetic of accepting a public board appointment has subtly changed. The sitting allowance may barely cover fuel, the obligatory funeral contributions and the expectations of an extended family now convinced that you hold the keys to the national treasury. The risks, by contrast, are anything but modest, from liability for decisions taken by management you did not hire to a financial label that can outlive the appointment. NyansaKasa (Words of Wisdom) observes that “a crown that weighs more than the head that wears it is not an honour but a burden in disguise.”
Why the World Built the Watchtower
Fairness demands that we first acknowledge why the watchtower was built. When General Sani Abacha died in 1998, investigators traced an estimated three to five billion dollars allegedly looted from Nigeria through banks in Europe and offshore centres. Cases like this taught the world that the most dangerous launderer is sometimes not the trafficker in the alley but the official in the motorcade, and the Financial Action Task Force (FATF) rightly asked banks to apply enhanced scrutiny to those holding prominent public functions.
When the Watchtower Forgets Where It Put the Gate
The difficulty is that a watchtower without a gate eventually becomes a prison. The European Union requires at least twelve months of heightened measures after an official leaves office. In practice, many institutions find it far safer to keep the label forever than to sign a decision removing it, for no compliance officer has ever been dismissed for being too suspicious. Britain learnt the price of this habit when the closure of Nigel Farage’s account at Coutts in 2023 became a national controversy and prompted a review by the Financial Conduct Authority, which reported in 2024 that every firm examined needed to improve. Britain now presumes lower risk for its own domestic officials, while American rules focus on foreign ones, so an African former chairperson may face heavier scrutiny abroad than a Western counterpart of identical honesty. NyansaKasa (Words of Wisdom) reminds us that “a warning light that never switches off soon stops warning anyone of anything.”
Ghana, Kenya and South Africa: Three Laws, One Long Shadow
Three of the continent’s leading economies show just how long the PEP shadow can be. Ghana’s Anti-Money Laundering Act, 2020 (Act 1044) and the 2025 guideline of the Bank of Ghana and the Financial Intelligence Centre expressly name board members of state enterprises as PEPs and set no point at which the status ends, while requiring banks to report every PEP transaction to the Centre. Kenya’s 2023 money laundering regulations likewise cover anyone who has held such a function, with their families and close business associates, again without any expiry date. South Africa once allowed the status to lapse twelve months after an official left office, yet its 2022 amendments, removed that window altogether. NyansaKasa (Words of Wisdom) observes that “a door that opens only inwards is not a door but a trap.”
The Bitter Seasoning of “Your Turn to Eat”
In parts of the continent, an unfortunate popular belief persists that an appointment means it is “your turn to eat”, so the honest professional who accepts a board seat is presumed from the first day to be preparing a generous plate. Yet the High Level Panel on Illicit Financial Flows from Africa estimated in 2015 that the continent was losing more than fifty billion dollars a year, roughly two thirds of it through commercial channels such as trade mispricing, with corruption accounting for a comparatively small share. We have pointed our brightest torch at the chairperson’s modest allowance while invoices for undervalued minerals glide through the warehouse gate in darkness.
A Party Card Nobody Asked to Carry
A further chill is political. In an increasingly polarised climate, a professional who accepts a public appointment is often assigned overnight to a party camp, as though competence must now carry a membership card. The engineer becomes “their man”, the accountant “their woman”, and decades of independent achievement shrink to an assumed allegiance. For experienced Africans in the diaspora, whose remittances to sub-Saharan Africa, by World Bank estimates, rival that very sum each year, such labelling is often the decisive deterrent. They will gladly send their money home; they hesitate to send themselves.
Accountability Without Exception, Fairness Without Apology
Public sector appointments made by a President are made in the name of the Republic and exist to serve the national interest, not the fortunes of any party. Those who loot the public purse must be pursued and held fully to account without fear or favour, and so too must those who occupy national office only to advance partisan interests at the nation’s expense. Yet accountability that cannot distinguish the thief from the trustee is no longer accountability at all; it is merely suspicion dressed in regulation. NyansaKasa (Words of Wisdom) counsels that “the national flag may carry many colours, but the nation itself belongs to no single party.”
The Hunter Who Stops Bringing Meat Home
Africa needs its finest engineers, doctors, accountants, scientists and governance professionals in its public institutions, many of whom are understandably reluctant to stake decades of reputation on a modest board fee. When the price of service includes lasting financial suspicion, partisan branding and a burden shared with one’s family, the rational professional may conclude that the nation is asking not for service but for sacrifice. NyansaKasa (Words of Wisdom) warns that “the hunter who is questioned every time he brings meat home will eventually hunt only for himself,” leaving the field to those least troubled by questions, who are precisely the people the safeguards were designed to catch.
Reversing the Trend Begins With Rules That Can Think
Reversing this drift requires not weaker defences but wiser ones. Regulators in Ghana, Kenya, South Africa and beyond should review PEP status at least twelve months after an official departs, continue enhanced scrutiny only where a written assessment justifies it, and give former officials a reasoned explanation and an independent appeal. Governments should strengthen transparent appointment processes grounded in competence, stagger board terms so that institutional memory survives elections, align fees and directors’ liability cover with genuine responsibility, and redirect investigative energy towards trade misinvoicing and hidden beneficial ownership.
The Harder Reform Lies Between Our Ears
Citizens, media and parties alike must learn to distinguish service from self-interest, judging appointees by conduct and results rather than by the government that appointed them, and welcoming capable professionals of every persuasion, generation and geography as custodians of a shared national estate. Appointees, in turn, must earn that trust by publishing asset declarations, declaring conflicts promptly and serving as though every decision will one day be read aloud to their grandchildren. A nation with talent from Accra to London and Houston cannot build its institutions with only half its bench. As our elders remind us, wisdom is like a baobab tree, which no single person can embrace alone.
The Final Inconvenient Truth
And so the question returns to the seasoned professional holding that appointment letter, wondering whether an increasingly thankless seat is worth its cost. It should not require heroism to serve, and a society that turns honest service into a lifelong liability will soon discover that it has many critics and very few trustees. The inconvenient truth is that the problem lies less with those who decline than with the conditions that make declining sensible. When congratulations and condolences arrive in the same envelope, the nation must ask what message it is truly sending. NyansaKasa (Words of Wisdom) offers the final word: “A country that punishes its honest servants will eventually be served only by those who have nothing to lose.”
About the Author
Ing. Professor Douglas K. Boateng is a strategist in governance, industrialisation and supply chains, and serves as a professional chairperson, an international Chartered Director (UK) and a Chartered Engineer (UK). A Pan-Africanist and social entrepreneur at heart, he has spent his career working across public institutions, corporate boards and industrial policy, in Africa and beyond, guided by the conviction that strong institutions are built one honest decision at a time. His contributions to industry and academia have earned him more than six lifetime achievement awards. He is the founder of NyansaKasa (Words of Wisdom), a collection of daily aphorisms he has written and shared since late 2019, distilling decades of experience advising governments, boards, and enterprises on governance, accountability, and institutional resilience into words meant to challenge and endure. He convenes the Boardroom Governance Summit, Africa’s largest boardroom-focused summit, and writes a widely read weekly op-ed series titled “Inconvenient Truth” and “What Is Wrong With Us”, featured on some of the region’s leading digital media platforms. Professor Boateng can be reached via LinkedIn or at info@panavest.com.
© 2026 Ing. Prof. Douglas Boateng. All rights reserved.
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