Nairobi, Kenya CPA(K) CIA Executive MBA BCom

Finance that holds up under scrutiny.

Thirteen years across Big Four assurance, multi-country audit leadership and a CFO mandate — spent closing financing rounds, and finding the misstatements underneath the ones that nearly weren't.

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Years in senior finance

13+

Markets covered

Kenya · Tanzania · Uganda · Rwanda · Burundi · South Sudan · Malawi · South Africa

Sectors

Banking · Insurance · Manufacturing & recycling · FMCG

Capital closed as CFO

USD 6M bridge round, in the first 3 months

Largest misstatement uncovered

A decade of 20% reported margin that was 5%

Leakage & unsupported balances flagged

KES 35M · TZS 256M · UGX 183M

Taking on

Fractional CFO mandates · Assurance & consulting reviews · CFO roles

§ 01 Work with me

Three mandates I take on

Each one starts the same way: a fixed-scope diagnostic, priced up front, with a written finding you can take to a board or a lender whether or not you continue with me.

Fractional & full-time CFO

For companies that have outgrown a finance manager — whether that means a few days a month or a permanent seat on the executive team. I own the monthly close, the board pack, the cash runway model, and the conversations with lenders and investors. At Mr. Green Africa that meant a USD 6M bridge round closed inside three months and a close cycle re-engineered down to the 7th working day.

Assurance & consulting reviews

For when the numbers stop reconciling with the story. Margin and revenue leakage, unsupported balances, procurement and commission loopholes, and the governance questions underneath them. I have found a 15-point margin overstatement that survived a decade of reporting, and surfaced irregularities that led to a fraud investigation and a finding of technical insolvency. Independent, documented, and written so a non-financial board can act.

Risk, controls & audit readiness

For the twelve months before an investor, a lender, a group auditor or a regulator arrives. ERM frameworks — including a KES 2 billion framework built and operationalised from scratch — control design and testing, IFRS-compliant reporting, multi-entity consolidation, and the evidence trail that turns a clean opinion from a hope into a plan.

§ 02 Selected engagements

Where the record was made

micro1 Independent contractor, finance domain · Feb 2026 – present

Context

A platform that recruits domain experts to build and stress-test the finance capability of frontier AI models.

Mandate

Author finance problems and reference solutions, evaluate model output on financial analysis and reporting, and review the work of other domain contributors.

Result

Selected through expert screening on professional writing, critical review and editorial judgement. Keeps a working view of where AI is genuinely useful in a finance function — and where it still gets the numbers wrong.

Mr. Green Africa Trading Limited Chief Finance Officer · Oct 2024 – Oct 2025

Context

A venture-backed plastics recycling and manufacturing business turning informal waste collection into a traceable, investable supply chain.

Mandate

Own the full finance agenda — FP&A, treasury, working capital, statutory and management reporting, compliance and enterprise risk — and advise the CEO and investors.

Result

Closed a USD 6M bridge round from new and existing shareholders inside the first three months. Uncovered a decade-long margin misstatement — 20% reported against 5% actual — that triggered a strategic repositioning and turnaround. Corrected business-model logic that had overstated cash runway by more than twelve months. Re-engineered reconciliations and GL posting to a 7th-working-day close.

Mr. Green Africa Trading Limited Head of Internal Audit, Risk & Compliance · May 2022 – Oct 2024

Context

The same business two years earlier, scaling fast on a sourcing model nobody had yet stress-tested against its own controls.

Mandate

Build the risk and control function from the ground up and support a major capacity expansion.

Result

Developed and operationalised a KES 2 billion ERM framework. Found and fixed a commission-based sourcing model that had cost KES 10M in six months, and closed double-purchasing loopholes spanning both systems and people. Partnered with the CFO on the cash conversion cycle, driving a 30% increase in collections. Advised a USD 13M scale-up, aligning sourcing volumes to plant capacity.

Liberty Kenya Holdings Plc Audit Manager, Internal Audit · Apr 2018 – Apr 2022

Context

A listed insurance and investment group — ten subsidiaries across Kenya, Tanzania, Uganda and Malawi, each under its own regulator.

Mandate

Lead internal audit across entities and jurisdictions, reporting into the audit committee on control, risk and compliance.

Result

Identified KES 35M of revenue leakage at Heritage Insurance Kenya from unmonitored exchange-rate movement. Flagged TZS 256M of unsupported facultative premium revenue and UGX 183M of unsupported intangible assets. Surfaced irregularities at Charter Malawi that led to a forensic investigation, revealing fraud and technical insolvency — and gave the Group time to act.

KPMG Kenya Audit Senior · Sep 2013 – Mar 2018

Context

Big Four external audit across banking, insurance, manufacturing and FMCG — KCB Group, HF Group, Old Mutual, Jubilee, EABL, De La Rue, Sameer Africa, Accenture and Pfizer among the portfolio, on engagements reaching from East Africa down to South Africa.

Mandate

Plan and execute statutory audits, coordinate group reporting, and brief boards on what the testing found.

Result

Promoted to Senior within two years of the graduate programme and rated Highly Effective in every annual review. Led the 2016 and 2017 KCB Group Plc audits — the Kenyan parent plus subsidiaries in Uganda, Tanzania, Rwanda, Burundi and South Sudan — coordinating group reporting and taking recommendations to the Board Audit Committee under a new group structure. Worked the South Sudan audit on the ground. Extended into South Africa on the Accenture engagement. Accredited L&D trainer; ran the department's IFRS 9 implementation training.

§ 03 The forensic file

Reading the failures on the record

Governance failures leave a paper trail. I write up East African cases the way I would work them — from the disclosures outward — because the same patterns show up in live engagements long before anyone calls them fraud.

Imperial Bank: what the accounts were saying before the collapse

A read of the disclosures, the related-party exposure and the audit questions that outlived the receivership.

In preparation

WPP Scangroup: an intercompany loan and the limits of a board

On the Thakrar investigation, the intercompany loan allegation, and what minority shareholders could actually see.

In preparation

Financing the circular economy without hand-waving

Why recycling businesses break on working capital rather than demand, and what the unit economics have to prove.

In preparation

§ 04 Background

Credentials and track

A career built deliberately across the three sides of the same table — the external auditor, the internal auditor, and the finance owner being audited.

Professional

Certified Public Accountant — CPA(K)
ICPAK member 20883

Professional

Certified Internal Auditor — CIA
IIA Kenya member 2189168

Academic

Executive MBA
Strathmore Business School

Academic

BCom, Finance — 2013
Jomo Kenyatta University of Agriculture & Technology

Board-facing

Audit committee reporting across multiple jurisdictions and a listed group structure

Languages

English · Kiswahili

§ 05 Contact

Start with the diagnostic

The most useful first hour is usually spent on one question you already suspect the answer to. Bring it, and I will tell you plainly whether it needs me, someone else, or nobody at all.

Direct

stevemaundum@gmail.com +254 711 186 438 WhatsApp — +254 711 186 438 linkedin.com/in/stephen-makau Book a time in my calendar