When Akwaugo Sylva Ezemoka began her career more than two decades ago, mobile phones and digital payments were still a novelty in Nigeria. Most transactions were completed with cash, and the idea of moving money instantly from one account to another was still far from everyday reality.
Today, both have become so commonplace that many Nigerians barely stop to think about the technology behind them. Akwaugo, however, has watched that transformation unfold from the inside.
Her career has taken her through telecommunications, corporate banking, and digital payments, placing her at the centre of industries that have fundamentally changed how Nigerians communicate, do business, and move money.
“I would like to think that my story is one of watching digital payments in Africa grow,” she says. “I came into the digital payments space early when instant payments were still novel and mobile adoption wasn’t quite what it is today.”
Akwaugo studied Polymer and Textile Engineering before earning an MBA from the University of Bradford, and like many engineering graduates, she initially expected to build a career in manufacturing. But internships exposed her to different possibilities, and by the time she graduated, she realised she was more interested in solving business problems than engineering materials.
That decision eventually led her to what was then VNetworks (now Airtel Nigeria), before she moved into corporate banking and later digital payments.
Over the last 20 years, she has built experience across customer relationship management, service quality management, wholesale banking, business development, and payments. In addition to her MBA, Akwaugo has completed executive programs at Lagos Business School, Nigeria, and Strathmore Business School, Kenya. She views her experiences as integral to her journey in helping people and businesses adopt technology that simplifies everyday life.
Why business development became her calling
For someone whose career has been shaped by business development, Akwaugo insists it wasn’t a path she deliberately planned.
“I think business development is a natural fit for me,” she says. “Right from childhood, I’ve been quite entrepreneurial.”
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Her first role after the National Youth Service Corps was at Airtel’s call centre, where she helped customers resolve issues with their mobile lines. Beyond troubleshooting, employees were encouraged to introduce customers to additional services whenever appropriate.
For Akwaugo, it wasn’t just about the sales targets; it was more about the philosophy behind the work. At the time, one of Airtel’s internal messages encouraged employees to ask customers a simple question: What can I do to make your life better?
When she joined UBA as Regional Service Quality Manager, she was responsible for improving customer experience across 33 branches in the Ikeja region. While resolving customer complaints was part of the job, she believed good service should go much further.
“I didn’t want the staff to just resolve problems,” she says. “I wanted the customer’s encounter with UBA to be the best moment in their day.”
To her, solving a customer’s problem and making them feel genuinely valued are two different things. One act was transactional, the other was a strategic brand differentiator.
“I think most problems are solvable,” she says. “You can solve the problem, but not just solve the problem, you can also pass a bit of happiness.” That mindset eventually pulled her towards strategic business development.
Working in service quality management meant she regularly interacted with relationship managers and corporate banking teams responsible for winning new business. Watching them build long-term relationships with clients convinced her she wanted to move beyond supporting customers to helping businesses grow. When the opportunity to join wholesale banking came, she took it.
“I think corporate banking has been the most shaping phase of my career.”
Corporate banking exposed her to businesses operating at scale, each with unique challenges and ambitions. It also showed that successful business development isn’t simply about hitting revenue targets. The real reward lies in creating lasting partnerships.
“I love a good success story,” she says. “I love relationships that are not purely transactional. I love relationships that are sustainable, where there’s sustainable success for the client and for me.”
It’s also why she believes commercial banking in Nigeria offers one of the toughest training grounds for anyone pursuing a career in business development.
“If you’ve really driven business in a commercial bank in Nigeria,” she says, “then you’ve done the deepest end of it, and there’s almost nothing you cannot do.”
Watching Nigeria’s payments revolution unfold
If corporate banking taught Akwaugo how businesses operate, digital payments showed her how technology could reshape an entire economy. The transition felt less like changing industries and more like continuing the work she had already started in telecommunications years earlier.
She joined the telecom sector in 2004, shortly after mobile phones became commercially available to more Nigerians. And what started as a product used by relatively few people quickly became an essential part of everyday life.
Today, the idea of living without a mobile phone feels almost unimaginable. She believes digital payments have followed a remarkably similar path.
Businesses that once relied almost entirely on cash now receive payments digitally. Consumers transfer money within seconds using their phones. Small merchants, transport operators, artisans, students, and people in the informal economy all participate in a payments ecosystem that barely existed two decades ago. For Akwaugo, watching that change happen has been one of the most rewarding parts of her career.
“That’s the exciting thing about working in digital payments,” she says. “You’re pushing digital payments adoption, but you’re seeing how it’s impacting lives at scale.”
She points to the growth of online businesses as an example. Without a reliable digital payment infrastructure, much of Nigeria’s digital economy wouldn’t exist in its current form. E-commerce, digital subscriptions, online marketplaces, ride-hailing services, and countless fintech products all depend on the ability to move money quickly and securely.
The technologies that have the greatest impact often become invisible, as they quietly integrate into everyday life until people stop noticing them altogether.
But while Nigeria has come a long way, she believes the industry’s biggest opportunities are still ahead. The next stage, she argues, isn’t simply about helping people move money faster. It’s about making payments work harder for consumers, businesses, and the wider economy.
Why moving money is no longer the biggest challenge
After spending years in the payments ecosystem, Akwaugo believes Nigeria has already solved one of its biggest financial challenges: enabling millions of people to move money digitally. The country’s shift away from a largely cash-dependent economy has been significant. Instant transfers are now routine, and digital financial services have become accessible to far more Nigerians than they were a decade ago.
What stands out most to her is how widely digital payments have spread.
“They are no longer confined to urban areas, very tech-savvy people, or large businesses. But, I think we are very, very far from finished.”
The industry has largely addressed the challenge of helping people send money. The next phase is about making payments more useful after the money has moved. That, she believes, changes the questions the industry should be asking.
Rather than focusing solely on how quickly money can move from one account to another, payment providers should consider what additional value they can create for the people and businesses involved in each transaction.
“Consumers no longer compare payment providers with each other; they compare them with the best digital experiences they encounter anywhere,” Akwaugo says.
Many of these consumers are already beginning to expect more. She points to cross-border payments as an example. People have become so accustomed to instant local transfers that they now expect international payments to be just as seamless. To her, that change in expectations reflects how quickly the ecosystem is maturing.
Why pull payments deserve more attention
One area Akwaugo believes is still largely overlooked is pull payments. Most Nigerians are familiar with push payments. A customer opens a banking app, USSD code, or mobile wallet and transfers money to another account.
Pull payments reverse that process. Instead of waiting for customers to initiate every transaction, businesses can automatically collect payments once customers have authorised them.
Lending is a good example of pull payments. When someone takes a loan, repayments are usually expected every month. If lenders depended entirely on borrowers remembering to make transfers, collection would become inefficient, and defaults would likely increase. Pull payments allow repayments to happen automatically, provided the customer has given consent.
The same principle applies to subscription services, insurance premiums, utility bills, and other recurring payments.
For businesses, however, the benefits go beyond collecting money. Many organisations still spend considerable time sending payment reminders, following up with customers, and manually reconciling payments after they are received.
Akwaugo believes much of that work can be automated. Businesses should be able to identify who made a payment, what it was for, and where it belongs without relying on lengthy manual processes.
“Every payment event should provide efficiency that ties it to the purpose of the payment so reconciliation becomes seamless.”
That’s why she sees recurring collections as one of the biggest opportunities in Nigeria’s payments ecosystem. According to her, moving money is only part of the equation. Helping businesses manage those payments efficiently is where the next wave of innovation lies.
Despite its potential, Akwaugo understands why many Nigerians remain hesitant about allowing businesses to deduct money directly from their accounts. Concerns around fraud, privacy, and unauthorised transactions are difficult to ignore.
“If we don’t address those concerns, then pull payments will remain a dream that never scales.”
She believes the solution starts with education. Many consumers assume that sharing their account number automatically gives businesses unrestricted access to their money. In reality, that is not how the payments ecosystem works.
“No financial services provider or bank would allow funds to leave a customer’s account without being absolutely certain that the customer authorised it.”
In reality, consent sits at the heart of digital payments. Before recurring payments can be processed, customers must explicitly authorise them, and that authorisation must be verifiable.
Financial institutions also have responsibilities. Banks and payment providers are expected to conduct extensive Know Your Customer (KYC) checks before allowing businesses to offer direct debit services.
For Akwaugo, technology alone won’t drive adoption. Success will depend on investments in both building customer confidence and building payment infrastructure.
“The providers that will win are the ones that understand customers’ concerns and put mechanisms in place to address them.”
The future of payments
Ask Akwaugo what digital payments will look like ten years from now, and she doesn’t begin with faster transfers or newer apps. Instead, she imagines a future where payments almost disappear.
People don’t wake up excited to make payments, she says. They pay because they want something else: electricity, healthcare, transport, education, insurance, or entertainment.
“The payment is simply the bridge. The more invisible the payment experience becomes, the better.”
She also expects payments to become smarter. Instead of simply showing an amount transferred, payment messages will carry richer information about why money was sent, making reconciliation easier for businesses and enabling more sophisticated financial services.
Infrastructure such as the National Payment Stack, developed by NIBSS, will play a major role in making that possible, she says, by providing payment providers with a foundation to build smarter products and entirely new use cases.
For years, discussions around financial inclusion have focused on numbers: how many bank accounts have been opened and how many Nigerians have enrolled for Bank Verification Numbers (BVNs). Akwaugo believes those metrics are no longer enough. The next phase of digital payments, she argues, should be measured by what those accounts actually enable.
Can more Nigerians access credit when they need it? Can insurance become more accessible? Can businesses reconcile payments more efficiently? Can more people save, invest, and build wealth through digital financial services? Those, she believes, are the questions that matter.
“I think success should go beyond the number of accounts. It should really be about impact and improvements in people’s lives.”
She also expects stronger interoperability across banks, fintechs, mobile money operators, and payment systems across Africa, making cross-border payments far more seamless than they are today.
