Shola Akinlade, co-founder of Paystack, establishes a football club in Lagos

Shola Akinlade, the CEO and co-founder of Paystack, one of Nigeria’s leading payment platforms, has established a football club in Lagos, Nigeria’s capital city, as part of a community project that he and his friends are spearheading.

According to Akinlade, the formation of the Sporting Lagos Football Club is an attempt to establish a modern football club that will nurture the next generation of Nigerian sporting talent.

He said the club’s establishment aligns with the movement to harness football’s transformative power to bring together people from all walks of life and create economic opportunities on a large scale.

The club is expected to play its first game in the Nigerian National League second division on Feb. 12 at the Teslim Balogun Stadium in Lagos, with ambitions to advance to the national league’s first division in the coming years.

While Akinlade assisted in the establishment of the football club, he said it will be led by a strong team that includes Godwin Enakhena, CEO of Global Media, who will serve as the club’s chairman, and Uzo Okonkwo, who will be the club’s general manager.

Ekene Agu, a Paystack employee, Colin Udoh, a former Super Eagles media officer, and Fola Olatuniji-David, a Google employee, have all been named to the club’s governing board, which will oversee the team’s strategic direction.

“As for me (Shola), I will remain fully focused on Paystack and building payments infrastructure for Africa. I’ll provide most of the financial investment necessary to get this off the ground and will entrust the full-time team to realize our bold ambitions,” he said.

In a recent pre-seed funding round, Akinlade and other angel investors invested $3.5 million in Edukoya, an ed-tech startup founded by Nigerian entrepreneur Honey Ogundeyi.