If 2024 was the year African tech startups struggled quietly with funding challenges, 2025 was the year they imploded spectacularly in public view. What emerges from the wreckage isn’t just a cautionary tale about governance failures and financial mismanagement—it’s a Master Class in how NOT to handle a PR crisis.
From one of Africa’s most celebrated fintech exits firing its co-founder over decade-old tweets, to venture capital firms caught misusing donor funds, to trading platforms using AI-generated celebrity deepfakes to defraud pensioners, 2025 delivered a relentless parade of scandals that made global headlines for all the wrong reasons.
These weren’t quiet failures. These were public meltdowns that played out across social media, courtrooms, and regulatory filings, each one more damaging than the last to Africa’s hard-won reputation as an emerging tech powerhouse.
Here are the PR disasters that defined—and damaged—African tech in 2025.
1. Paystack’s Messy Founder Firing: When Your Past Becomes Your PR Crisis
The Setup: Paystack, acquired by Stripe for over $200 million in 2020, represented Africa’s fintech dream realized. Co-founder and CTO Ezra Olubi was a poster child for Nigerian tech success.
The Disaster: In mid-November 2025, allegations surfaced on social media that Olubi had inappropriate relations with a subordinate. Within hours, the internet resurfaced explicit tweets from 2009-2013, including sexually suggestive comments about colleagues and minors. One read: “Monday will be more fun with an ‘a’ in it. Touch a coworker today. Inappropriately.”
Paystack suspended Olubi and announced an independent investigation. Then, just 10 days later—before that investigation concluded—the company fired him.
The PR Carnage: Olubi went public immediately, claiming he was terminated “without any meeting, hearing, or opportunity to respond” and that the process violated Paystack’s own internal policies. He announced plans to sue.
Paystack’s response? Silence for days, then a statement claiming they fired Olubi for “significant negative reputational damage” from the tweets—separate from the workplace misconduct investigation, which was “still ongoing.”
Legal experts questioned the optics: If these tweets were public knowledge during Stripe’s 2020 acquisition, why terminate now? If the investigation was ongoing, why fire him before it concluded? And if the tweets were the issue, why launch a workplace misconduct investigation at all?
The Lesson: Paystack’s crisis response looked reactive, inconsistent, and legally questionable. The company that built its brand on trust and transparency appeared to prioritize PR damage control over due process. Whether Olubi’s behavior warranted termination became secondary to the question of whether Paystack handled it professionally.
Quote: Legal experts told Techpoint Africa the case raised “fresh questions about accountability procedures, and whether external pressure influenced Paystack’s decision.”
2. M-KOPA’s Co-Founder War: When Your Success Story Becomes a Shareholder Nightmare
The Setup: M-KOPA, Kenya’s $1 billion+ solar fintech success story, was riding high. Fresh off a partnership with Japan’s Sumitomo Corporation and consistently profitable after years of losses, the company seemed unstoppable.
The Disaster: In November 2025, co-founder and former CFO Chad Larson filed a bombshell complaint with Kenya’s Capital Markets Authority, accusing M-KOPA’s board of orchestrating a “manipulated” share buyback that exploited Kenyan employees.
Larson alleged the board used an artificially suppressed valuation—representing a “95% discount to actual market value”—to force employee shareholders to sell their stakes at unfairly low prices. He claimed Sumitomo Corporation’s board representative participated in approving a buyback that directly benefited Sumitomo, a clear conflict of interest.
He also alleged M-KOPA gagged employees from discussing the buyback among themselves or seeking legal advice, and barred “minor shareholders” (those with fewer than 500 shares) from meetings and company notices.
The PR Carnage: M-KOPA fired back with a scathing public statement calling Larson’s allegations “baseless” and a “campaign of misinformation.” The company claimed Larson left in 2018 when M-KOPA was losing money, that he’d since worked for a competitor, and that his $4-10 billion valuation estimates were “demonstrably false” and would make M-KOPA worth more than Kenya’s two largest public companies combined.
The back-and-forth escalated into a full social media war, with both sides releasing statements, leaking correspondence, and making accusations. A parallel lawsuit by former employee Elizabeth Njoki alleging racial discrimination in the shareholding structure added fuel to the fire.
The Lesson: M-KOPA’s aggressive counter-attack strategy—questioning Larson’s motives, highlighting his departure during tough times, and emphasizing his competitor ties—may have legal merit but created a devastating narrative: A company celebrated for “empowering the underbanked” was now accused of exploiting its own employees.
The Capital Markets Authority ultimately confirmed the matter wasn’t in its jurisdiction since M-KOPA is UK-registered, but the damage was done. M-KOPA transformed from African success story to cautionary tale about who really benefits when startups grow.
Quote: A prominent African VC told Techmoonshot: “You can’t be the poster child for financial inclusion while allegedly excluding your own employees from sharing in the value they created.”
3. 54 Collective’s $689K Rebrand That Killed a $106M Fund
The Setup: 54 Collective (formerly Founders Factory Africa) was Africa’s most active investor in 2024, having raised $106.5 million from the Mastercard Foundation and Johnson & Johnson to support African startups. Over 70 companies backed, 17,500 jobs created, bold pan-African vision.
The Disaster: In August 2024, the organization unveiled a sleek rebrand to “54 Collective”—complete with new logos, polished messaging, and continental ambitions. There was just one problem: They funded it with restricted charitable grant money explicitly earmarked for SME support and youth employment programs.
When Mastercard Foundation discovered the $689,000 rebrand violation, things spiraled fast. A forensic audit by Deloitte uncovered over 2,000 backdated journal entries, missing audited financial statements for 2023-2024, and a $4.59 million transfer from the nonprofit Africa Founders Ventures (AFV) to its for-profit sibling Founders Factory Africa—both run by the same leadership.
The PR Carnage: Mastercard Foundation terminated the grant in January 2025. Instead of acknowledging the mistake and negotiating repayment, AFV’s leadership placed the organization into “business rescue” (bankruptcy protection) without notifying Mastercard until nearly two weeks later—a clear violation.
The judge wasn’t having it. In a July 2025 ruling, Judge Johann Gautschi called the move “an abuse of process” and ordered AFV into liquidation, imposing punitive costs. He ruled the organization had deliberately tried to use bankruptcy proceedings to block Mastercard from recovering its money.
54 Collective’s CEO Bongani Sithole later claimed “the grant was not terminated due to a breach,” contradicting the court record and Mastercard’s statements. The organization’s website went dark, its LinkedIn went dormant, and over 40 employees were laid off without severance.
The Lesson: This wasn’t just financial mismanagement—it was a Master Class in how to destroy credibility. 54 Collective took donor money meant for African entrepreneurs and spent it on corporate vanity, then tried to use legal technicalities to avoid repayment. The backfiring was spectacular.
Quote: Judge Gautschi’s ruling noted the organization created a “co-mingling of branding” between charitable and for-profit entities that violated the grant agreement and risked “transferring goodwill built with charitable funds to commercial ventures.”
4. Banxso: When Deepfake Fraud Meets Legitimate Brand Partnerships
The Setup: Banxso positioned itself as a democratizing force in South African finance, sponsoring the national soccer team Bafana Bafana and partnering with UFC champion Dricus du Plessis. The company had a license from the Financial Sector Conduct Authority (FSCA) and presented itself as a legitimate trading platform.
The Disaster: Behind the legitimate facade was the biggest fintech fraud of 2025. Banxso’s customer acquisition engine ran on deepfake videos of Elon Musk, Johann Rupert, and other business icons promoting an “Immediate Matrix” trading system that promised to turn R4,700 deposits into R300,000 monthly passive income.
Victims—including pensioners who lost their life savings—were funneled from these fake ads directly to Banxso platforms. Once registered, “success managers” would pressure them to invest more to “recoup losses” as their trades mysteriously turned negative.
The FSCA investigation revealed the “offshore liquidity providers” Banxso claimed to use were actually beneficially owned by Banxso’s own shareholders. Client funds weren’t being traded—they were being misappropriated.
The PR Carnage: By December 2025, the FSCA imposed a record ZAR 2 billion ($118 million) fine on Banxso and its directors, with individual fines reaching ZAR 20 million. Key executives including former CEO Manuel de Andrade received 30-year industry bans—the maximum penalty ever imposed.
The Western Cape High Court placed Banxso under provisional liquidation in August after Judge Andre le Grange ruled the company’s entire business model was illegal. Over 150 clients filed claims totaling R181 million.
One victim, Carol Margaret Wentzel, a 60-year-old pensioner, lost approximately R500,000 after being lured by deepfake Musk ads. She described Banxso as a “criminal enterprise.”
The Lesson: Banxso perfected the fraud playbook of 2025: Use AI-generated deepfakes for credibility, secure legitimate brand partnerships for legitimacy, operate behind a regulatory license for trust. The combination was devastatingly effective until it collapsed.
Quote: An FSCA statement revealed Banxso “misappropriated client funds, provided false and misleading information to clients and to the FSCA, promised clients unrealistic returns and failed to act in the best interests of its clients.”
5. CBEX: When “AI-Powered Trading” Means AI-Powered Ponzi Scheme
The Setup: CBEX marketed itself as an AI-powered crypto trading and investment platform with high-production marketing materials and social media campaigns featuring the latest in fintech innovation.
The Disaster: On April 17, 2025, CBEX froze withdrawals and crashed its dashboards, instantly revealing itself as a sophisticated Ponzi scheme. The platform had used deepfake videos of Elon Musk and Johann Rupert endorsing “automated trading systems” that promised returns exceeding 100% monthly.
The PR Carnage: A crowd-sourced investigation tallied $16.5 million in reported losses from just 380 victims. Experts believe total exposure could exceed $100 million once all markets are accounted for.
The collapse demonstrated how AI tools can supercharge traditional fraud schemes, lowering barriers to creating convincing fake endorsements at scale.
The Lesson: CBEX wasn’t just a scam—it was a preview of the fraud landscape in an AI-dominated world. The barrier to entry for sophisticated financial fraud has never been lower.
6. The Silent Shutdowns: When Startups Ghost Their Users
The Setup: Across 2025, several once-promising African startups—Okra, Lipa Later, Bento Africa, and Edukoya—faced financial headwinds that forced closures or administration proceedings. In a mature ecosystem, controlled shutdowns with transparent communication are standard practice. In Africa in 2025, they became PR disasters.
The Disaster: These companies shared a fatal flaw: they shut down without coherent communication strategies to users, partners, or stakeholders. Some went completely dark on social media. Others posted vague “pausing operations” messages without timelines or user data migration plans. Several left customers with trapped funds, unused credits, or unfinished transactions.
Okra, the open banking API provider that raised $4.5 million and served over 100 financial institutions, quietly stopped processing API calls in early 2025. Developer partners discovered the shutdown not through official communication, but through cascading system failures and unanswered support tickets. The company’s social media went dormant without explanation.
Lipa Later, Kenya’s once-buzzing buy-now-pay-later startup that raised over $14 million, entered administration with minimal warning to merchants who had integrated its payment solution. Small businesses discovered their checkout systems were broken when customers complained—not through proactive outreach from Lipa Later.
Bento Africa, the pan-African HR and payroll startup that raised $1.85 million, ceased operations, leaving employers scrambling to process payroll through alternative systems mid-month. The company’s final communication was a brief LinkedIn post that didn’t address data migration, outstanding payments, or transition support.
Edukoya, the edtech platform founded by a former Lambda School executive, shut down its learning platform with a generic “we’re exploring strategic options” message that left students with incomplete courses and unclear refund policies.
The PR Carnage: The silent shutdown trend created a narrative far more damaging than the closures themselves: African startups can’t be trusted to fail responsibly.
Users who lost money posted angry threads on Twitter/X detailing how they were ghosted. Business partners publicly questioned whether they could trust African tech vendors for mission-critical systems. Investors began requiring “sunset clauses” in investment agreements specifying minimum communication standards if portfolio companies shut down.
Industry commentator Osarumen Osamuyi captured the sentiment in a viral tweet: “Your startup shutting down isn’t the PR crisis. Ghosting your users, merchants, and partners IS. We deserve better than being left on read by companies we trusted with our money and data.”
The Lesson: How you shut down defines your professional reputation far more than how you launched. Founders who ghost their users burn bridges they’ll need if they ever try to build again. VCs who allow portfolio companies to exit without user communication damage their own dealflow as founders avoid firms with poor shutdown track records.
A proper shutdown communication includes: advance warning to users, clear timelines for service discontinuation, data export/migration options, refund procedures for unused credits, answers to FAQs, and contact information for ongoing issues. None of these companies delivered all of these basics.
The Ecosystem Impact: The silent shutdown trend reinforced the worst stereotypes about African tech: that it’s immature, unprofessional, and treats users as expendable. For an ecosystem trying to build trust with risk-averse enterprise customers and institutional investors, every ghosted shutdown makes the next founder’s job harder.
Stripe’s Patrick Collison once said, “How you treat people on the way down says everything about your character.” In 2025, too many African startups showed they valued growth over character—and torched their reputations in the process.
7. Glovo Nigeria’s Brand Impersonation Enablement (Ongoing)
The Setup: Glovo Nigeria, the Spanish delivery giant’s African operations, positioned itself as empowering local food vendors and connecting them to customers across 11 Nigerian cities.
The Disaster: In October 2025, Nigerian food vendor “Corporate Ewa Agoyin” sent a legal demand letter accusing Glovo of enabling fraudsters to impersonate her brand on the platform, delivering substandard and potentially unsafe food to customers under her identity.
The letter claimed Glovo confirmed the imposters were “registered business entities” but refused to provide documentation proving they had authorization to use Corporate Ewa’s trademark, branding, and intellectual property. The vendor alleged Glovo enabled the impersonation for months despite repeated complaints.
The PR Carnage: The case went viral on Nigerian social media under the explosive allegation “Glovo is poisoning Nigerians.” Instagram user @ade_authority posted images of the legal letter, claiming Glovo received it but “refused to acknowledge it.”
The scandal fit a pattern: In September 2025, Nigerian lawyer Bamidele Ikusika threatened legal action after being charged ₦22,340 for a ₦17,180 order, with customer support “inconsiderately dismissing” his complaint. A 2025 sentiment analysis found 91% negative sentiment on order accuracy issues among Glovo Nigeria’s 169 negative Google Play reviews.
The Lesson: Glovo’s silence strategy backfired. By not publicly addressing vendor verification failures or responding to the legal notice, the company allowed a narrative of negligence and food safety violations to dominate. In Nigeria, where 59% of household income goes to food, this isn’t just bad PR—it’s a public health crisis narrative.
Status: Case ongoing; Glovo Nigeria has not publicly responded.
The Common Threads: What These Disasters Reveal
Across these very different scandals, several PR failure patterns emerge:
1. The Silence Strategy Doesn’t Work
Whether Paystack’s delayed response, Glovo’s non-response, or 54 Collective’s contradictory statements, staying quiet in the social media age doesn’t make scandals go away—it amplifies them. Silence creates a vacuum that critics, plaintiffs, and journalists eagerly fill.
2. Process Matters As Much As Outcome
Paystack may have had legitimate grounds to fire Olubi, but the rushed, seemingly inconsistent process became the story. In PR crises, HOW you handle something often matters more than WHAT you’re handling.
3. Governance Failures Create PR Disasters
Every single scandal traces back to governance: unclear founder agreements (M-KOPA), misuse of restricted funds (54 Collective), inadequate vendor verification (Glovo), missing regulatory controls (Banxso). Bad governance eventually becomes public relations carnage.
4. The Legitimacy Paradox
Banxso and CBEX both demonstrated that markers of legitimacy—regulatory licenses, brand partnerships, high-production marketing—can enable fraud at scale. The more legitimate you appear, the more damage you can do when exposed.
5. AI Lowered the Fraud Barrier
Deepfakes fundamentally changed the fraud landscape in 2025. Creating convincing fake celebrity endorsements now requires technical skills, not insider access. Every company using celebrity testimonials or executive communications should be preparing for deepfake attacks.
6. Social Media Is the Courtroom Now
M-KOPA, Paystack, and Glovo all learned that the court of public opinion operates faster, louder, and with less regard for legal niceties than actual courts. Legal strategies that ignore social media dynamics are incomplete strategies.
What African Tech Should Learn
These disasters happened to marquee names—companies with strong brands, sophisticated investors, regulatory licenses, and professional communications teams. If it can happen to them, it can happen to anyone.
For Founders:
- Get founder agreements in writing before you raise a dollar
- Build board governance from day one, not after you raise Series B
- Your past is permanently searchable; assume everything you’ve ever posted will resurface at the worst possible moment
- Prioritize due process over PR damage control; rushed decisions create bigger scandals
For VCs and Boards:
- Donor-backed venture models need ironclad separation between nonprofit and for-profit entities
- Employee equity programs require transparent valuations and independent fairness opinions
- Crisis response plans should assume everything will leak; build for transparency, not opacity
- When founders conflict, the court of social media rules faster than any legal process
For Platforms:
- Vendor verification isn’t optional; inadequate KYC becomes brand impersonation scandals
- Customer complaints that seem small can become existential PR crises
- Your platform’s integrity is your most valuable asset; protect it before growth metrics
For Regulators:
- Record fines matter, but they come too late to protect victims
- Licensing requirements need to keep pace with AI-powered fraud
- Deepfake fraud requires new regulatory frameworks and enforcement tools
The Bigger Picture
African tech raised $3 billion in 2025—a 33% increase from 2024. The ecosystem is growing, maturing, and attracting serious capital. But growth without governance, scale without accountability, and innovation without ethics create ticking time bombs.
2025’s PR disasters weren’t just about individual company failures. They exposed systemic issues: rushed scaling, inadequate oversight, governance as afterthought, and crisis response as reactive scramble.
The ecosystem that emerges from 2025 should be more skeptical, more demanding, and less willing to celebrate growth metrics without asking hard questions about how that growth was achieved and who benefited.
These scandals were painful, public, and expensive. The only thing worse would be failing to learn from them.
The Question for 2026: Will African tech treat these disasters as teachable moments or unfortunate outliers? The answer will determine whether 2025’s PR carnage was a turning point or just the preview of more chaos to come.
