Money Laundering Reporting Officer (MLRO)

About the Role

Absa Group is looking for a Money Laundering Reporting Officer to steer financial crime compliance for its Zambia business. The role focuses on strengthening the bank’s controls and ensuring that operations remain aligned with local regulation, group standards, and international best practice.

This position is responsible for planning, coordinating, and monitoring compliance activities so that approved operational objectives are delivered efficiently and effectively. It also carries accountability for the ongoing development and execution of the Financial Crime Compliance Framework across AML, CTF, sanctions, KYC, and anti-bribery and corruption matters.

Key Responsibilities

Lead the implementation and ongoing improvement of the financial crime compliance programme for Absa Bank Zambia.

• Maintain strong KYC, CDD, and EDD controls that meet both group expectations and Zambian regulatory standards.
• Support a risk-based customer segmentation and surveillance framework.
• Manage AML transaction monitoring capabilities, including alert thresholds and tuning.
• Ensure suspicious transaction and suspicious activity reports are submitted on time to the Financial Intelligence Centre.
• Oversee sanctions and politically exposed person screening controls.
• Identify control or system gaps and drive remediation actions.
• Ensure adherence to both global sanctions requirements and local directives.
• Own the AML monitoring platform and related reporting processes.
• Prepare management information for country, regional, and group stakeholders.
• Produce periodic MLRO reports, KRIs/KROs, and required regulatory filings.
• Maintain, refresh, and monitor country-level financial crime policies and standards.
• Carry out gap assessments and track implementation of updated policies.
• Escalate policy breaches promptly.
• Support engagement with regulators, especially the Financial Intelligence Centre and the Bank of Zambia.
• Manage the anti-bribery and corruption framework in line with group requirements.
• Ensure incidents are detected, escalated, investigated, and remediated.
• Promote awareness of reporting channels for employees, third parties, and customers.
• Serve as subject matter expert for AML, sanctions, KYC, and anti-bribery and corruption topics.
• Deliver training and awareness sessions across the bank.
• Advise business teams on compliance-related issues.
• Lead, coach, and develop the financial crime compliance team.
• Set performance goals and standards for the team.
• Support talent development, coaching, and succession planning.
• Help build a strong ethical and compliance-led culture across Absa Zambia.

Requirements

• Bachelor’s degree in Business, Commerce, or Management Studies.
• Strong working knowledge of AML, CTF, sanctions, KYC, ABC, and related regulatory controls.
• Experience handling financial crime compliance processes, monitoring, reporting, and policy governance.
• Ability to manage stakeholder communication and support regulatory engagement.
• Capability to lead a team, coach others, and promote a high-performance culture.
• Sound understanding of compliance frameworks, risk-based monitoring, and escalation practices.

About Absa

Absa describes itself as an African banking group with more than a century of history, combining local roots with regional and international capability. The organisation positions this role as part of its broader journey to shape the future of the group and support career growth through development tools and guidance.