Yacoob Abba Omar

Yacoob Abba Omar is Head of Strategy and Communications at the Banking Association of South Africa. From January 2013 to December 2016 he worked at the Mapungubwe Institute (MISTRA), a Johannesburg-based research institute. Before that, he served as South Africa’s Ambassador to Oman from 2003 to 2008 and then the United Arab Emirates from 2008 to December 2012. He had a brief spell in the private sector when he was appointed Public Affairs Director at Meropa Communications from 2002 to 2003. This was after working as Deputy Director-General of Government Communications and Information System (GCIS) from 1998 to 2002 and GM: Public Affairs at Armscor from 1993 to 1998. Prior to South Africa’s first democratic elections in 1994 Abba served in the African National Congress in several capacities. He is currently completing his PhD on ‘Sovereignty and National Identity in South Africa’ through Wits University. He graduated with an M.Phil in South African Political Economy through the Nelson Mandela Metropolitan University. Abba currently serves on the South African Tourism Board, on the advisory committee of the University of Witwatersrand’s Centre Diversity Studies, and as an Advisory Board member of the Institute for International Management Practice, Anglia Ruskin University, and Cambridge.