Mr. Rizwan Desai

Board Director

Appointed 13 October 2025

Rizwan Desai is the Founder and Managing Partner of Desai Law Desai, a full services law firm in Gaborone. He specialises in high end corporate and structured finance transactions, regulatory work, mining and energy transactions, capital markets, banking, financial services, private equity and securities. He also has extensive experience in general corporate and commercial practice involving mergers, acquisitions, joint ventures and competition law. He is widely regarded as first-tier and one of the leading citizen corporate and transaction lawyers in Botswana.

Mr. Desai is an admitted Attorney of the High Court of Botswana. Mr Rizwan Desai is previously qualified as a solicitor in Scotland, England and Wales and as an attorney in New York. He practiced at a major UK law firm prior to returning to Botswana in 1999 and holds a LL.M from Harvard Law School as well as DIP. LP  and LL.B (Hons) both from the University of Edinburgh.

Mr. Desai is the former chairman of the Botswana Stock Exchange and Barclays Bank of Botswana Limited (now Absa Bank Botswana Limited) (2009 to 2017). By virtue of having held these positions, Mr. Desai has extensive experience of corporate governance, management of and interaction with boards, regulators (including Bank of Botswana and NBFIRA) and stakeholders/shareholders of large organisations.