APO Group appoints Rania El Rafie as vice president of public relations and strategic communications

Rania El Rafie, vice president of public relations and strategic communications at APO Group

APO Group, the premier award-winning pan-African communications consultancy and press release distribution service, is delighted to announce the appointment of Rania El Rafie as vice president of public relations and strategic communications.

Egyptian El Rafie is the first candidate to be promoted to VP of public relations and strategic communications from within the company, and the youngest person ever to hold this key role. She joined APO Group as account director in 2020 and was promoted to group account director shortly thereafter. In the last three years, she has been responsible for managing the company’s most prestigious accounts, delivering huge success for both her clients and APO Group itself.

APO Group’s VP of public relations and strategic communications is one of the most important and influential roles in the African PR industry. El Rafie heads up a team with unparalleled experience that operates ‘on the ground’ in Africa, reaching every country and every corner of the continent.

El Rafie and her team provide a gateway to the media, and are responsible for supporting some of the biggest global organisations operating in Africa today, including: FIFA, Canon, Nestlé, TikTok, Jack Ma Foundation, Liquid Intelligent Technologies, Marriott, AstraZeneca, European Investment Bank, Afreximbank, Islamic Development Bank, Vertiv, NBA, Basketball Africa League, Siemens Gamesa, Siemens Energy, GITEX, KONE, Mercy Ships, MSD, Qatar African Business Forum, Western Union, and Rugby Africa.

El Rafie’s performance as group account director made her the unanimous choice among the APO Group leadership team when the position of VP of public relations and strategic communications became available.

In her time at APO Group, she has already played a pivotal role in two award-winning campaigns for Canon Central and North Africa at the PRovoke Africa SABRE Awards – Africa’s leading Public Relations Awards. El Rafie was also heavily involved in further SABRE Award success thanks to her work with The Jack Ma Foundation and the International Organization for Migration (IOM).

As group account director, El Rafie helped many clients – including Canon and the NBA – achieve exceptional media attendance at events in Cairo; she delivered the overall international media hosting programme at GITEX Global in Dubai; and she was also a key moderator during the Africa Women Innovation & Entrepreneurship Forum (AWIEF) Cairo summit in 2022.

El Rafie has more than 20 years of experience in public relations, working her way up through the ranks in a number of key roles across Africa and the Middle East.

Prior to joining APO Group, El Rafie was the regional account director for Ketchum RAAD Middle East Dubai, managing client PR accounts and providing strategic counsel to prominent clients such as Etihad Airways, Nissan, P&G, and CNN.

She also spent five years at the world-famous J. Walter Thompson PR in Dubai, part of the global WPP group, where she managed key accounts within the consumer and financial PR sectors across the MENA region.

El Rafie holds a bachelor’s degree in business administration from the American University in Dubai (AUD). She is also a dedicated mother to two boys, Youssef and Yassin.

As she commences her new role, El Rafie will embark upon a personally tailored Executive Leadership Development Plan, which APO Group founder and chairman Nicolas Pompigne-Mognard says will help her to reach her great potential and allow her to flourish at the very highest level of African public relations.

“We are absolutely thrilled to welcome Rania to the leadership team,” said Nicolas Pompigne-Mognard, founder and chairman of APO Group. “I’ve been enormously impressed with her progress since joining the company, as she has delivered for our biggest clients time and again. Her appointment was a completely unanimous decision across the management group and reflects her vast potential to propel our public relations division forward still further.”

"I am truly honoured and grateful for the trust placed in me by our management team,” said Rania El Rafie, APO Group’s VP of public relations and strategic communications. “One of the things that I’ve always loved about APO Group is the sense of closeness and collaboration, and it is a privilege to lead such a diverse and experienced team. I look forward to building on our outstanding culture of high performance, commitment to quality, and continuous improvement. More than anything, I’m excited about the possibilities that lie ahead."