Mr Walid Genadry was recently honoured as a “Distinguished Fellow” of the International Association of Insurance Supervisors (IAIS), (the equivalent of the Basel Committee for the establishment of international standards of the banking sector), along with three other supervisors: Robert Esson (US), Michael Oliver (UK) and Victor Rod (Luxemburg), in appreciation for their significant contributions to the advancement of the Association.
The ceremony took place during IAIS’s annual Global seminar in Budapest in June on a Danube boat cruise.
Mr Genadry, who built from scratch the Lebanese Insurance Supervisory Authority and headed it for 13 years, held at IAIS several positions, namely: member of the Executive Committee, Vice Chair of the Implementation Committee, Chair of the Supervisory Development Group, and Vice Chair of the Regional Coordination Sub-committee.
During the ceremony, the IAIS’s Chair of the Executive Committee, Mrs Victoria Saporta, thanked Mr Genadry for “his contribution to the advancement of IAIS activities and more specifically for being a driving force for promoting education and training of insurance supervisors on a worldwide basis”. She noted that “Walid led the development of IAIS’s supervisory development strategy which represents today the foundation on which IAIS’s international standards implementation activities are built”.
In a letter, Mr Felix Hufeld, previous chair of IAIS’s Executive Committee and president of the German financial sector supervisory authority, wrote: “Walid has gained the respect of his peers and his outstanding philosophy was of great value for shaping a better supervisory world.”
At a regional level, Mr Genadry was also honoured last April by the Arab Forum of Insurance Regulatory Commissions (AFIRC) of which he is a founding member and former Chair. AFIRC’s present Chair, Mr Hassan Boubrik (Morrocco), delivered a speech where he said: “Walid’s constructive and distinguished role in advancing the Forum’s strategy and implementation of its activities, and more notably the development, with the help of the World Bank, of a self-assessment program for Arab supervisors.”
He thanked Mr Genadry for the role he played to establish professional ties with the IAIS and for the organisation of the first regional AFIRC conference for the insurance sector held in 2011 in Lebanon.