Chuma Ezirim, is a Group Executive, E-Business and Retail Products at First Bank. His division develops and manages all Digital and Retail Products in the Commercial Bank Group.
He is a Certified International Cards & Payments Professional (CICPP) and a Fellow of
the International Academy of Cards & Payments. An Industrial Chemist by training, he
has about 30 years of professional banking experience. He holds a B.Sc Degree in
Industrial Chemistry from the University of Nigeria, Nsukka and an M.Sc degree in the
same field from the University of Ibadan. He was the best Graduating Student in Industrial
Chemistry in his first degree. He also has an MBA from the University of Nigeria and he’s
an alumnus of Wharton School, Kellogg School of Management and Lagos Business
School. He has attended several advanced Leadership and Strategy courses.
Chuma has had over 25years career in the electronic banking business across 4 banks in
the industry, where he set up the Business in 3 of the Banks. He played a major role in
driving the adoption of debit card usage in Nigeria by deploying and managing the most
efficient and profitable ATM network, which at that time accounted for over 25% interbank
transactions in the market.
He has implemented over 18 Digital Payment Platforms across 7 markets in Africa, which
are self-accounting and managed as revenue centres. In Nigeria, about 7 of these
platforms are market leaders in the volume of transactions processed and net revenue.
In the last 13 years, he has led the crafting and execution of a highly successful
Digital/Retail banking business strategy for FirstBank, that has won the bank over 75
International and Local Awards. During this period, amongst many other feats, the bank
grew the number of retails accounts from about 4.2m to over 41m, drove electronic
channels adoption from less than 20% to over 90%, enrolled the highest number of
Digital Banking Customers in the industry, was the first bank in Nigeria and second in
Africa to issue more than 10 million debit cards, grew the Retail asset products portfolio
by over 250% in the last 5 years with about 85% of the loans disbursed digitally from less
than 2%, deployed the most expansive Bank-led Agent Banking Network and Bank/Telco
Agnostic Wallet Platform in Africa and leads the industry in Digital Business net revenue
performance. As at 2021, EFG Hermes, conservatively valued the Digital business of the
bank at over US$1.1B, the highest in Africa.
In 2012, Chuma led the Payment Systems Transformation Work-stream of Payments
Systems and Infrastructure Sub- Committee of the Bankers' Committee of Central Bank
of Nigeria that formulated some of the current electronic payment policies in the market.
He also chaired the Industry Association of Heads of e-Business from 2009-2012.
He has worked with and provided strategic counsel to people at different levels in the
Electronic Payment Industry from subject matter experts to CEOs and Board members
of leading Financial Services Organizations across Africa.
Chuma is a member of MasterCard Africa Leadership Council and sits on the boards of
First Bank Democratic Republic of Congo, Unified Payment Services Ltd and
Payattitude Global Ltd.
He is married and has two children.