Legal Counsel

Job Summary

Purpose of the Role

The Legal Counsel is responsible for providing expert legal advice, manage legal risks, and ensures compliance with laws and regulations. The ideal candidate will have a strong background in corporate law, project finance, and regulatory compliance within the energy sector. This role also coordinates all company secretarial functions the company including board governance and managing external legal counsel.

Job Details

Main Responsibilities:

Commercial Support:

Responsible for drafting documents related to Starsight activities, which can include statements, contracts, or agreements, ensuring that the agreements are readable and enforceable and that they represent Starsight best interests.
Structuring deals relating to commercial transactions, effectively managing legal risks.
Lead the legal aspects of major transactions, including due diligence, negotiation, and documentation.
Conduct appropriate due diligence on prospective customers/stakeholders to determine their viability and effectively manage potential legal risks.
Debt recovery, where legal intervention is required.

Legal and advisory services

Act in a supporting and advisory capacity to the Management in gathering and evaluating relevant facts, researching applicable laws and providing recommendations on the legal implications of proposed policies, decisions, actions, business initiatives and highlighting attendant risks.
Provide legal guidance for Starsight organization in decision making and protect against any form of litigation (in areas including, but not limited to employment law, contracts, litigation, leases, regulatory compliance and intellectual property matters).
Interface with the retained external solicitors
Manage, in conjunction with external solicitors, all ongoing litigation and dispute resolution matters.
Collaborate with management to devise efficient and effective defence strategies.
Specify internal governance policies and regularly monitor compliance.
Deal with complex matters with multiple stakeholders.
Provide advisory services on all correspondence with third parties after obtaining relevant information from the affected department.
Ensure group-wide compliance with relevant laws, regulations, and internal policies.
Serve as the key liaison with regulators, vendors, and legal service providers.
Collaborate closely with the Finance team and other internal departments to support business operations and strategic initiatives.

Provide Company Secretarial Support

Maintain at all times and create (where not available), records of all companies within the group i.e. Statutory books with the relevant jurisdiction laws.
Manage the company secretarial function across all group entities, including scheduling board meetings, preparing board packs, and ensuring compliance with statutory requirements.
Administration of board and general meetings i.e. proceedings of company in-
Preparing and sending out notices

Corporate Governance

Support management in efforts geared towards setting the overall philosophy and strategy of the organization regarding legal and corporate governance matters and ensures all practices, policies, and business activities fall within the bounds of the company’s legal posture.

Regulatory Compliance

Ensures that Starsight comply with laws and guidelines related to her business or other activities, anticipate changing laws and codes that Starsight may not be aware of and take actions to ensure that the organization does not violate these laws.
Encourage and ensure 100% compliance with all laws and regulations as it relates to every department in each company within the group.
Protection of the Intellectual Property Rights and Registration of the logos and slogans (where required).
Execute procedures for protecting patents, trademarks, and industrial designs.
Continued Legal Education Reading and researching on new laws, regulations and policies that are relevant to the Group’s interest. Attending conferences and seminars organized by Regulatory bodies relevant to the Group’s interest.

Requirements

Required Education and Experience

First degree in law from a reputable university.
Minimum Five (5) Years of post call relevant work experience gained in a large law firm and/or in-house with a well-structured organization.
Excellent knowledge and understanding of corporate law and procedures, commercial issues, financial practices and concepts
High degree of professional ethics and integrity
Sound judgement and ability to analyse situations and information
Excellent interpersonal, communication and presentation skills, with ability to communicate effectively (written and oral) with other at all levels of the organisation and externally.
Proactive with excellent critical and problem-solving skills.
Excellent Multi-tasking and organisational skills.
Ability to work independently, with little or no supervision.
Ability to work in a multicultural environment.
Strong experience in energy, infrastructure, or project finance sectors.
Solid understanding of company secretarial duties and board governance.
Excellent contract drafting and negotiation skills.
Strong interpersonal skills with the ability to work with senior leadership and external stakeholders.
Proven ability to manage multiple priorities in a fast-paced environment.

Tools & Systems

Proficiency in Microsoft Office Suite (Word, Excel, PowerPoint, SharePoint)
Experience using board management platforms (e.g., DiliTrust) is an advantage

About Company

Starsight Energy

https://starsightenergy.com/

The Starsight Energy Africa Holding group of companies is an Africa focused pure-play commercial and industrial (“C&I”) renewable energy service provider, covering the full scope of C&I projects, from rooftop projects to large scale corporate Power Purchase Agreements (“PPA”) backed projects. It provides carbon reduction, power security and cost savings to blue-chip clients in a number of key economic sectors including banking, healthcare, education, manufacturing and data storage. The group spans three key geographical hubs (Eastern, Southern and Western Africa) with operations in Nigeria, South Africa, Ghana, Kenya, Namibia, Tanzania and Uganda. It is backed by Helios Investment Partners and African Infrastructure Investment Managers (“AIIM”). For more information, please visit: https://starsightenergy.com/who-we-are/group/