French telecom group Orange has appointed Alioune Ndiaye, former Director General of the company's subsidiary Sonatel, as the CEO for Orange Middle East and Africa (MEA) region.

Stéphane Richard, President and CEO of the Orange group made the announcement at the end of a meeting with the President of the Republic of Senegal, Macky Sall.

Richard said Orange MEA has transformed into an autonomous entity with full management status.

"The first step of this transformation plan led to the creation of the holding company that brings together all of Orange's activities in Africa and the Middle East. The OMEA holding company, which brings together 21 countries and a fleet of 130 million customers, now enjoys full management status and autonomy," he said.

Ndiaye joined Sonatel as CEO in October 2012, taking over from Cheikh Tidiane Mbaye. Under his leadership, Orange in Senegal oversaw the operations in Mali, Guinea and Guinea Bissau, and Sierra Leone, recording increase in subscriber base from 18,301,170 customers in December 2012 to 30,166,130 customers in December 2017.

He also oversaw a surge in the turnover of Sonatel from 663 billion in 2012 to 972.9 billion FCfa in 2017.

In 2012, Sonatel contributed 2.2% of the Orange group's turnover which rose to 3.5% in 2017 - a development Ndiaye credited to strategic investments and the development of data and mobile money segment.

Bruno Mettling, CEO of Orange Middle East and Africa said the latest appointment is part of effort aimed at increased the number of Africans on Orange's executive board.

"The objective is to integrate in the composition of the executive committee one-third of executives from Africa and the Middle East before the end of the first semester," he said.

ITWeb Africa recently reported the promotion of Elisabeth Médou Badang, former Director of the Cameroonian subsidiary, as Area Director and spokesperson for Orange MEA.

With a growth of 5.4% in the fourth quarter of 2017, OMEA confirmed the solidity of its economic and financial model, thus becoming the Orange Group's first growth area at the end of 2017. OMEA currently has only 50 expatriates out of the 20,000 employees in its 21 countries.