When the “darling” of African tech stumbles, the shockwaves aren’t just felt in Lagos, they rattle investor confidence in Toronto, London, and New York.
When Paystack co-founder Ezra Olubi was abruptly dismissed on November 22, 2025, the shockwaves reverberated far beyond the boardrooms of Lagos. For Nigerians in the diaspora, those who view African startups not merely as businesses, but as symbols of cultural resilience and viable investment assets, the scandal is more than a headline. It is a stress test of trust.
For years, Paystack has served as the “proof of concept” for the African tech renaissance. Its $200 million acquisition by Stripe in 2020 was the signal many in the diaspora were waiting for: validation that Nigerian innovation had matured from potential to power. It became the company cited at dinner tables in Houston and board meetings in London as evidence that Africa was ready for global capital.
But the sudden termination of a founder amid allegations of misconduct and “serious reputational harm” stemming from resurfaced tweets dating back to 2009–2013, forces a difficult conversation. It compels us to ask whether Africa’s most celebrated tech unicorns have built the governance structures necessary to sustain their valuation.
The crisis highlights a jarring disconnect. In the diaspora, professionals operate within rigid frameworks of corporate governance, where compliance is king and board independence is non-negotiable. Yet, looking back home, the ecosystem often still feels driven by “founder power” rather than institutional strength.
When founders themselves become the source of crisis, the conversation shifts from innovation to accountability. For the diaspora investor, the question is no longer “How fast can you grow?” but rather, “Are your institutions strong enough to survive your leaders?
“This is the Akatarian view: we cannot celebrate the rise without scrutinizing the foundation.
The Double Standard: “Lagos Realities” vs. Global Expectations
For the Nigerian professional working in Toronto’s financial district or London’s Canary Wharf, news from home often requires a mental “code switch.”
In the West, they operate within corporate environments defined by rigid compliance. Here, a decade-old tweet or an undisclosed conflict of interest is not just a PR headache; it is a fireable offense, often triggering immediate investigations by ethics committees. The standard is absolute: the institution’s reputation always supersedes the individual’s talent.
Yet, when these same professionals look toward the Nigerian tech ecosystem, the very ecosystem they champion to their foreign colleagues, they often encounter a jarringly different reality. It is a world where “Founder Culture” frequently overrules corporate governance. In Lagos, the “Big Man” syndrome can insulate leaders from the consequences that would be instant career-enders in New York.
This creates a painful dissonance. Diaspora investors are often asked to accept “Lagos Realities,” the notion that things just work differently in Nigeria; that due process is fluid, and personality cults are necessary for survival. But the Paystack crisis challenges this leniency. It suggests that what was once tolerated as “startup scrappiness” is now a liability.
The Ambassador’s Burden
The true cost of this scandal is not just financial; it is reputational collateral damage. Every Nigerian in the diaspora acts, unwillingly or not, as an unofficial ambassador. When they pitch a Nigerian startup to a Canadian venture capitalist or convince a British partner to hire a Lagos-based engineering team, they are putting their own social capital on the line. They are vouching for the ecosystem.
When a giant like Paystack stumbles over fundamental questions of conduct and accountability, it makes that advocacy exponentially harder. It forces the diaspora apologist to retreat, leaving them with the exhausting task of explaining yet again, that Nigerian innovation should not be judged by its worst headlines.
As Chika Okafor, a Toronto-based fintech consultant, noted to Akatarian: “We are tired of making excuses. We cannot demand global capital while clinging to local habits. If we want to play in the big leagues, we have to wear the uniform.
”Systemic Failure: The “Big Man” Syndrome in Corporate Africa
To view the Paystack crisis in isolation is to miss the forest for the trees. As Professor Yomi Fawehinmi, an expert in organizational development who has analyzed the fallout, noted in recent reports, this incident forces a reckoning with “internal governance” and the digital footprints of leaders. It is symptomatic of a broader, more corrosive pattern in African corporate culture: the “Big Man” Syndrome.
In many African markets, deference to leadership is cultural. The “Oga at the Top” is rarely questioned, and founders are often treated with a reverence that borders on immunity. When this cultural reality intersects with the “move fast and break things” ethos of Silicon Valley, it creates a dangerous blind spot. Boards become cheerleaders rather than overseers, and compliance becomes an afterthought to growth.
Echoes of Steinhoff and MTN
The diaspora remembers the collapse of Steinhoff International in South Africa. For years, CEO Markus Jooste was the golden child of the Johannesburg Stock Exchange. His board, blinded by his star power and the company’s rapid expansion, failed to ask the hard questions. When the accounting irregularities were finally exposed in 2017, they didn’t just dent the company’s reputation; they wiped out over R200 billion in shareholder value overnight. The lesson? A star CEO is no substitute for a strong audit committee.
Closer to home, the MTN Nigeria crisis of 2015 serves as another grim precedent. A failure to comply with a regulatory directive to disconnect unregistered SIM cards led to a staggering $5.2 billion fine. It was a compliance failure of epic proportions, born from a corporate culture that perhaps believed it was too big to be disciplined.
The Founder’s Dilemma
Paystack is not Steinhoff, and Olubi is not Jooste. Yet, the parallel remains in the fragility of founder-led firms. In the early days of a startup, the founder’s sheer force of will is the engine of survival. But as a company matures into a “unicorn,” that same dominance becomes a liability.
For the diaspora investor looking in, the Paystack unraveling raises a critical red flag: Are we investing in institutions, or are we investing in personality cults? When the “Big Man” falls, does the structure hold? In this case, the cracks in the foundation are visible.
Capital, Culture, and the “Japa” Anxiety
For the African diaspora, the relationship with Nigerian tech is not merely transactional; it is symbiotic. The diaspora provides the early-stage capital, the global networks, and the critical “remittance advocacy” that fuels these startups. In return, companies like Paystack provide something intangible but equally valuable: evidence.
They serve as evidence that Nigeria is more than its challenges. They are the counter-narrative to the headlines about corruption and inefficiency. When a diaspora professional invests in a Nigerian startup, they are buying a stake in a new national identity. But when that identity is tarnished by governance failures at the highest level, the currency of trust is devalued.
The “Japa” Paradox: A Tainted Credential?
Perhaps the most poignant fallout is the human cost, specifically regarding the “Japa” phenomenon—the migration of Nigerian talent to the West. For years, a stint at Paystack was viewed as the “Golden Ticket.” It was the Nigerian equivalent of having Google or McKinsey on a CV, a badge of competence that opened doors to Tech Nation visas in the UK or skilled worker permits in Canada. Now, current and former employees face a new anxiety. In the global job market, where background checks are rigorous and reputational risk is quantified, will a connection to a scandal-ridden leadership team become a liability?
A young software engineer in Lagos, hoping to move to Berlin next year, now worries: “Will recruiters ask me about the culture? Will they assume I was part of a toxic environment?” The scandal threatens to turn a badge of honor into a topic of interrogation.
The Path Forward: From Founder-Led to Institution-First
If the Paystack crisis is a wake-up call, the response cannot simply be outrage. It must be reform. For the diaspora investor, whether an individual writing a $5,000 angel check or an investment club deploying millions, the strategy must shift. We can no longer rely on the “good guy” theory of investment. We must demand structural assurances that protect the institution from the individual.
Here are three specific governance reforms that diaspora stakeholders should demand from the African startups they back:
- 1. The “Governance Audit” Clause
Financial audits are standard; governance audits are rare. This must change. Diaspora investors should push for a “Governance Due Diligence” clause in term sheets. Before capital is deployed, an independent body must verify not just the bank accounts, but the decision-making structures.
- 2. Whistleblower Safety Valves
In a culture where “snitching” is stigmatized and retaliation is common, internal HR departments are often insufficient. Startups receiving diaspora capital should be required to subscribe to third-party ethics hotlines—anonymous reporting channels managed by independent firms. If an employee fears for their job when reporting an ethical breach, the governance structure has already failed.
- 3. Decoupling the “Founder-King”
Silicon Valley often celebrates the “Founder-CEO-Chairman” model, but in emerging markets with weaker regulatory oversight, this concentration of power is dangerous. We must advocate for the separation of the CEO and Board Chair roles. The person running the company cannot be the same person grading the homework.
The Verdict: Accountability is the New Innovation
The dismissal of Ezra Olubi is a painful chapter for Nigerian tech, but it may yet prove to be a necessary one. For too long, the narrative of “Africa Rising” has relied heavily on the charisma of its storytellers, the visionary founders who could spin gold out of the grit of Lagos or Nairobi. We celebrated the individuals because the institutions were too weak to inspire confidence.
But the ecosystem has outgrown that phase. The Paystack scandal signals the end of the era of blind faith. For the diaspora investor, the message is definitive: Accountability is the new innovation.
We cannot build world-class companies on third-world governance structures. If we want our startups to outlast their founders, if we want to build generational wealth that survives the transfer of power, we must build systems that are intolerant of misconduct, regardless of who commits it. The diaspora has a unique role to play in this reconstruction. We hold the capital, the global network, and the leverage. It is time we used it not just to fund the next big idea, but to demand the governance that ensures that idea survives.
