Jamal Fakhro

Jamal Fakhro

Jamal Mohamed Fakhro (born 1956) is a Bahraini (veteran legislator, business advisor and a member of the Bahraini upper house parliament - Shura Council). Jamal is the Managing Partner for KPMG (one of the Global Big 4 professional services firms’) in Bahrain and Qatar. Jamal also happens to be the first ever Arab to be appointed as a member of the KPMG Global Board and Global council. Jamal is also the Chairman of the KPMG Middle East and South Asia (MESA) Board; and member of the KPMG Europe, Middle East and Africa (EMA) Regional Board. Having served as Managing Partner since 1987, he has extensive experience in the field of Audit, Tax and Advisory services in the region, especially for government sector, and banking and financial services companies. Jamal also advices many family businesses in relation to family governance, risk and sustainable succession planning.

Jamal has a special interest in the matters of Corporate Governance, and is a Founding Board Member of the Pearl Initiative in the Middle East, an initiative developed with the collaboration with the UN office for partnership aiming for transparency and accountability in the private sector.

Public interest

Jamal has been an active member of the Shura Council (Consultative Council (Bahrain)) since 1992 and the First Vice Chairman for a number of legislative terms. A member of the Shura Council for over two decades, Jamal has held responsibility in a lot of critical roles in different fields. For many years he was the Chairman of the Committee on Financial and Economic Affairs.

Jamal was also a member of the Committee preparing the National Action Charter of Bahrain (2001), subsequently he was a member of the committee activating the National Action Charter (2002), the National Dialogue (2011), and the National Committee to follow up on the implementation of the Bahrain Independent Commission of Inquiry (BICI) Report (2011-2012).

In his role as Shura Council member, Jamal has headed up a number of international, regional & national delegations at parliamentarian conferences. Jamal has been heading the Bahrain delegation to the IPU (Inter-Parliamentary Union) since 2007.

Board Membership & Affiliations

Jamal is a board member of several organizations and NGO’s and Civil societies in Bahrain. Amongst them, he was member of the board of trusties of Bahrain Bayan School, Awal theater, the Bahrain Chamber of Commerce committees, the Bahraini Association of Accountants (former chairman), the Accounting Audit Committee of Islamic financial institutions, Almuntada Society (chairman), the Businessmen Association for Development and the American Society for Certified Public Accountants (1990). He is also a Founding Board member of the Pearl Initiative in the region.

KPMG

After graduating from Cairo University in accounting in 1977, Jamal joined Fakhro Establishment for Accounting and Auditing (first national accounting and auditing firm established in Bahrain in 1968). The firm then was focusing on national work and clients and had not more than 15 employees. Jamal along with the partners of the firm (Jassim Fakhro and Hussain Kasim) worked together to join a global firm and succeeded in becoming a national representative firm of KMG in 1982. In 1988 Jamal successfully led the negotiation of merging the operations of Fakhro Establishment and Peat Marwick to establish KPMG Fakhro in Bahrain. Jamal as the managing partner of the firm, was successful in leading the firm over the years to be the largest accounting and auditing firm in Bahrain. In 1997, Jamal negotiated with KPMG International to acquire the operations in Qatar and since then the Qatar operation was established as one partnership with the Bahrain operations. Today, the Bahrain and Qatar offices, have a team of over 600 partners and people.

Shura Council

In 1992, a Shura Council was established in Bahrain with 30 members; Jamal was amongst them and was the youngest member. Since then Jamal has continuously been reappointed for the various Shura Council (four years term) roles and is one of the longest serving member since then.

Art connoisseur

Politics and business did not deter Jamal from pursuing his passion for Art. Jamal is a unique collector in the sense that rather than pursuing the ‘brand’ artists or discovering the next big star he prefers to spend time to reflect on each piece to ensure that they fit within his personal aesthetics as a priority. Jamal started purchasing art in the mid-80s primarily to support Bahraini artists. However, this hobby turned into a passion through the support and encouragement from friends and artists. With a collection that highlights and showcases significant Arab artists, he also has some great pieces that were done by international artists like Tomaino and Olga Sinclair.

Personal life

Jamal married Lubna Al Amin, a well known Bahraini artist (who has participated in over 50 exhibitions across Europe and the Middle East), and they have 3 children, sons, Feras Fakhro, Zeyad Fakhro and daughter Reem Fakhro.

Recognitions

Jamal was recognized and honoured with the Shaikh Isa bin Salman Al Khalifa Medal of a second-class, by His Majesty King Hamad bin Isa Al Khalifa, at the opening ceremony of the eighth session of former Shura Council

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