As a young girl growing up in Zambia, Dr Tukiya Kankasa-Mabula was raised in a home that was both politically alive and powerfully affirming. Her father, a former freedom fighter during Zambia’s struggle for independence, encouraged her to think critically and speak freely. Her mother, also a freedom fighter and later the head of women’s affairs in Zambia, was the woman who signed the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW), an international treaty adopted by the United Nations General Assembly in 1979, often referred to as an international bill of rights for women, on behalf of the country. She remembers editing her mother’s speeches on women’s rights, gender equality and equity, long before she knew she would one day write her own legacy into Africa’s financial systems.
“I have never shrunk because I am a woman,” she says. “I embrace my womanhood and claim my place at the table, even if I’m the only woman in the room.”
That conviction would define the course of her life, taking her from lecture halls to the highest levels of financial policy and reform, both at home, across Africa and globally.
From academia to capital markets
Dr Kankasa-Mabula’s first professional calling was in academia. A trained lawyer, she taught business and commercial law at the University of Zambia. But Zambia’s early capital markets reforms soon created an unexpected opening. With her background in business law and research, she was invited to help shape the newly formed Securities and Exchange Commission.
What began as a temporary assignment taken during a sabbatical became a turning point. She recognised the broader picture that fair and inclusive financial systems could have a direct impact on national development. She never returned to full-time academia.
She joined the Bank of Zambia as Chief Legal Advisor and Board Secretary in 1998. Later, in 2007, she was appointed Deputy Governor, only the second woman in the institution’s history to hold the role. From the start, she saw her position not only as a leadership role but also as an opportunity to build systems that work for everyone. She said: “From the central bank vantage point, I asked: what can we do about the barriers women face?”
Dr Kankasa-Mabula’s approach has always centred on systems change, not handouts, but fairness, not intentions, but evidence. While she never confused the role of a central bank with that of a lender, she used her strategic position to influence the entire financial ecosystem. “I deeply believe Africa will only develop when women are enabled to participate fully,” she says. “When you lift up a woman, you lift a family, a community, and ultimately a nation.”
Not only did her influence reach global platforms, at home, but she also helped integrate gender considerations into Zambia’s National Financial Inclusion Strategy, led the development of a framework for collecting sex-disaggregated financial data, and supported the groundwork for a women’s Bank, which would specifically cater to underserved women entrepreneurs.
During her tenure, women’s formal financial inclusion rose from 38.2% in 2015 to over 61% by 2020; the gender gap narrowed, women’s share of loans grew, and their repayment rates exceeded men’s.
From convening to outcomes: the Expert Leaders Group
After retiring from the Central Bank in 2019, Dr Tukiya Kankasa-Mabula continued her mission on a continental stage. In 2020, Mrs Graça Machel invited her, alongside other women leaders in finance, to co-create the Graça Machel Trust’s Expert Leaders Group (ELG), where she has served as the inaugural Chair and Convener through 2025.
From the outset, Dr Kankasa-Mabula has drawn a clear line from convening to outcomes. In 2020, Mrs Graça Machel convened a small co-creation team comprising Dr Monique Nsanzabaganwa, a Rwandan economist; Ms Gail Makenete, former Second Deputy Governor of the Central Bank of Lesotho; Dr Charity Dhliwayo, former Deputy Governor of the Reserve Bank of Zimbabwe; and Dr Kankasa-Mabula. Together, they helped shape the ELG’s purpose, membership and approach.
The work began with national convenings in at least seven countries, before expanding into regional platforms across the East African Community (EAC), the Southern African Development Community (SADC), and the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS).
Dr Kankasa-Mabula also credits Ms Makenete for her steady leadership during a one-year interregnum, helping sustain momentum and coordination as the ELG transitioned from its founding convenorship to the appointment of the current Chair, Mrs Aishah N. Ahmad.
For Dr Kankasa-Mabula, this continuity of leadership from the ELG’s co-creation, through Ms Gail’s period of coordination, to Mrs Ahmad’s chairship reflects a principle that has defined her life’s work: inclusion must be intentional, succession must be deliberate, and leadership must always serve a larger purpose. As she reminds the group, “It is not automatic that being a woman makes you gender-sensitive; the ELG mindset harnesses women’s leadership for inclusion.”
Her philosophy has remained the same: inclusion must be intentional, and leadership must serve a purpose.
About The Author
About The Author