Naseem Banu Lahri

MD Lucara Botswana

Naseem Banu Lahri is a seasoned Executive Leader with more than 18 years of experience in the mining industry. She has a Masters in Strategic Management (BCOM, FCCA) and has held key strategic roles throughout her career. In May 2018 she was promoted to the position of Managing Director at Lucara Botswana, being the first woman and the first Motswana woman to serve in this capacity for a diamond mining company in Botswana and the youngest female MD in mining in the world.Throughout most of her career, Lahri has taken strategic positions on different boards. She has served as a board member on the Debswana Pension Fund, Botswana Accountancy College and Pula Medical Aid. She was recently appointed as a board member at First National Bank Botswana which is rated the best bank in the country.
Lahri was labelled by Forbes, the New Yorker, Mining Weekly and Vogue as the youngest female to run a diamond mine in the world and a trailblazer in the industry. In November 2020, she was nominated as the Top 100 Women in Mining. In addition, Lahri was nominated under the Business Woman of the year category at the 2022 All Africa Business Leaders Awards. She was awarded the Forbes Woman Africa Impact Award at the 2022 All Africa Business Leaders Awards. The award honours female leaders who have transformed a market, company, product or service and who, through their work. This award has only been awarded to 4 women (Lahri included) in the 10 years history of the AABLA Awards. During the 11th African Leadership Magazine Awards in 2023, Lahri was conferred with the African Mining Personality of the Year Award. The award is in recognition of Naseem Lahri's strategic leadership pedigree in the mining sector which is marked by excellence, tenacity and dedication to duty. In 2023, Lahri was chosen to represent the Diamond, gold and/or platinum group metals producer forum on the RJC Board of Directors. Lahri has been named the African Female Leader of the Year 2024 by the African Leadership Organisation. Lahri has succesfully completed the Senior Executive Program - Africa with Harvard Business School in August 2024.