The United Bank for Africa Plc has introduced a new Aggregator Sales Structure for its RedPay POS and Agency Banking Network, aiming to strengthen its relationships with partners and promote greater financial inclusion throughout Nigeria.

The newly launched multi-benefit structure was unveiled at the inaugural UBA Aggregator Engagement Session, held at the bank’s head office in Lagos on Tuesday. The session, themed ‘POS-itive Impact: Connecting Agents, Merchants, and Customers’, served as a collaborative platform to align strategies for scaling the UBAMONI Agency Banking ecosystem and bringing together key industry aggregators, Point-of-Sale partners, and network managers.

UBA’s Executive Director Designate, Digital Banking, Emmanuel Lamptey, who spoke at the event, said, “Today’s session marks a pivotal step in our collective journey to democratise financial access in Nigeria.

By bringing together our valued aggregators and partners, we are strengthening the ecosystem that connects UBA directly to communities and ensuring that reliable financial services are within everyone’s reach.”

Emphasising the need for partnerships, UBA’s Head of Digital Banking, Shamsideen Fashola, who presented the keynote address, outlined the strategic imperative behind the new structure.

“Our aggregators are fundamental to realising our ambition of building Africa’s most impactful digital collections network. This structured framework is designed to be scalable, transparent, and mutually rewarding, empowering our partners with the technology and support needed to drive agent productivity as well as serve underserved communities effectively,” Fashola noted.

The lender said that the platform delivers comprehensive value to agents and aggregators alike, featuring instant settlement, reliable transaction processing, real-time dashboard reporting, and a full suite of services, including dispute and terminal management, analytics, card withdrawals, bill payments, and pay-with-transfer.

For aggregators specifically, the model provides a structured opportunity to onboard and manage agents within UBA’s network and access attractive incentives and commissions, as well as leverage a dedicated Aggregator Admin Portal for real-time visibility into agent performance and transactions.

Adetunji Iyiola, UBA’s Head of Agency Banking, highlighted the customer-focused nature of the initiative, saying the new structure significantly enhances collaboration between UBA, its merchants, and agents.

“This rollout is about creating superior value for every stakeholder and enabling better service delivery to customers while ensuring our partners have the tools and incentives to thrive. It reinforces our promise to deliver essential banking services exactly where they are needed most,” he said.

With the introduction of the aggregator framework, UBA further cements its leadership in pioneering innovative digital financial solutions that bridge the inclusion gap and drive economic empowerment across the African continent.

The Executive Chairman of the Nigerian Revenue Service, Zacch Adedeji, says technology is a crucial factor in the implementation of the new tax laws.

Adedeji made the statement on Wednesday during the inaugural convocation lecture at the Federal Polytechnic, Ayede, in Ogo-Oluwa Local Government Area, Oyo State, titled “The Role of Technology in Implementing Nigeria’s New Tax Laws: Challenges, Prospects, and Implications for National Development”.

In a statement by his Technical Assistant on Print Media, Sikiru Akinola, the NRS chairman listed some of the most fundamental challenges confronting taxation to include infrastructure, skills, trust and resistance.

He said each of these challenges would be addressed with the imminent upgrading of the country’s tax system for a digital environment: “Nigeria has recently enacted a new set of tax laws, representing the most significant restructuring of our nation’s fiscal legislation in 50 years. While public conversation often frames these changes as legal reforms, and that is true, it is also an incomplete picture.

“These laws are not merely changing rates, definitions, or administrative powers. They are quietly redefining how authority operates within the tax system. This is a complete structural overhaul, signalling the end of tax collection as a manual task and the beginning of tax intelligence. If you read the new laws carefully, you will notice a subtle but profound assumption woven throughout their fabric. They presuppose the existence of reliable taxpayer identification, integrated data across institutions, traceable transactions, automated processes, and scalable enforcement.

“In other words, these laws are built for a digital environment. They cannot function properly in a manual, fragmented, paper-based system. The implication is clear: without technology, the laws remain aspirational. With technology, they become operational. This transition is central to the mandate of the Nigeria Revenue Service as we implement this new legal framework. Historically, tax administration relied heavily on human discretion over who was registered, who was assessed, who was audited, and who was penalised. While discretion is not inherently evil, excessive discretion creates inconsistency, which in turn breeds mistrust and drives non-compliance.”

Speaking further, Adedeji noted that when infrastructure improves, capacity grows, trust is protected, and resistance is managed just as technology begins to do what policy alone cannot.

“One of the most important prospects of a technology-driven tax administration is the ability to expand the tax base without increasing tax rates. This matters deeply in a society where citizens already feel overburdened.

“By improving visibility and bringing previously unseen economic activity into view, technology levels the playing field. When compliance broadens, the pressure on the existing base reduces, fairness improves, and legitimacy grows. This is how modern tax systems grow revenue sustainably,” he added.

In his remark, the Speaker of the House of Representatives, Tajudeen Abbas, encouraged the graduating students to be good ambassadors of the institution.

Abass, who was represented by the senator representing Oyo North, AbdulFatai Buhari, charged them not to relent in their efforts to acquire more knowledge.

The institution’s governing council chair, Yakubu Datti, commended Adedeji for leading the re-engineering of Nigeria’s tax architecture.

The Rector of the institution, Dr Taofeek Abdul-Hameed, charged the graduating students to emulate Adedeji, who, he said, began his journey from a polytechnic.

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The Code of Conduct Bureau on Wednesday quizzed the leadership of the Ondo State Oil Producing Areas Development Commission over alleged misappropriation of funds belonging to the commission to the tune of N463m.

Those invited by the CCB included the secretary of the commission, Mrs Abike Bayo-Ilawole, and two other directors.

Bayo-Ilawole, who was among the public servants recently promoted to the position of permanent secretary in the state, was alleged to have been involved in the misappropriation of about N463m in the commission a few weeks ago.

She was specifically accused of diverting part of the money to a private bank account.

Speaking with journalists after being questioned by CCB officials at the bureau’s office in Akure, Ondo State, on Wednesday, Bayo-Ilawole said she was invited over allegations of fund misappropriation but maintained that she was innocent.

She said, “I was invited by the Code of Conduct over alleged fund misappropriation. We just started the investigation. The allegation is about N463m. I told them nothing of such happened, and the record will speak for itself.”

On the allegation of diverting money to a personal account, she said, “I said the record will speak for itself. It is not true. The one they quoted, that money was sent to my father’s account, was for a long-term project.

“My father was a contractor then, and it was not up to that amount. But the record will speak for itself, as I said.

“The two officers whose names were mentioned supervised other colleagues. It could be their allowances or what they needed to spend on the project.

“They should allow me to go through the records so we can separate the issues and know what actually transpired. One major thing is that the fund was not released at once; it was over a period of time.

“We have projects such as school renovations, transformers and office renovations. Our areas are riverine, so we move around for supervision.

“We are not talking about missing funds. The projects were completed. We followed the necessary procedures before executing the projects.”

She insisted that she had documents to back her official dealings in the commission, reiterating that “the record will speak for itself.”

Also speaking, the Director of Project Planning and Development at OSOPADEC, Mr Olukorede Adeshina-Oladapo, said he was invited over an allegation circulating on social media.

He said, “What was on social media was not correctly presented.

“In the office, we got approval from the governor to carry out direct labour jobs. We had 21 school renovation projects, renovation of the area office, construction of culverts in Atijere and renovation of an office complex. Those transactions were done through direct labour.

“We have a procurement committee. Other management staff were involved, and records of meetings were kept. We reported to the Office of the Director of Public Prosecutions, which benchmarked the project requests.

“It was not only the 21 projects approved by the governor, but we selected those that were urgent and could be attended to immediately. Those were the ones executed.

“Before we proceeded, after the governor’s approval, we requested a ‘no objection’ from the appropriate office, and it was granted.

“As we complete the projects, we also apply for certificates of completion. Some of the projects have been completed, while funds for others are still in the account. No fund is missing.”