{"id":277490,"date":"2026-02-10T21:02:09","date_gmt":"2026-02-10T21:02:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/277490\/"},"modified":"2026-02-10T21:02:09","modified_gmt":"2026-02-10T21:02:09","slug":"m-pesa-africa-md-sitoyo-lopokoiyit-to-exit-safaricom-in-march-2026","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/277490\/","title":{"rendered":"M-PESA Africa MD Sitoyo Lopokoiyit to exit Safaricom in March 2026"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/02\/dc200216-645f-44db-8e35-01dfa1e8d764.jpeg\" class=\"ui-draggable ui-draggable-handle\" style=\"max-width: 100%; width: 100%;\"\/>Sitoyo Lopokoiyit, Managing Director of M-PESA Africa<\/p>\n<p>Sitoyo Lopokoiyit, Managing Director of M-PESA Africa, will leave Safaricom on 31 March 2026 to take up a new role outside the Vodacom Group, the company has announced.<\/p>\n<p>Lopokoiyit has led M-PESA Africa since April 2021, overseeing its expansion to eight African countries and serving over 60 million customers and more than 5 million businesses. <\/p>\n<p>Under his leadership, the platform evolved from a peer-to-peer money transfer service into a comprehensive fintech ecosystem that includes payments, savings, credit, merchant solutions, and both interoperable and global payments.<\/p>\n<p>He joined Safaricom in July 2011 as Head of M-PESA Strategy and Business Development and has held several senior roles within the Safaricom and Vodacom groups, including Director of M-Commerce at Vodacom Tanzania and Chief Financial Services Officer at Safaricom PLC. <\/p>\n<p>As a member of the executive committee, he has contributed to many of Safaricom\u2019s key milestones.<\/p>\n<p>Prior to joining Safaricom, Lopokoiyit worked across multiple sectors, including as Business Advisor and Merchandising Manager at Caltex under Chevron Kenya Limited.<\/p>\n<p> His early engagement with Safaricom helped shape the agent aggregator model now widely used in mobile money globally.<\/p>\n<p>During his tenure, he also played a major role in forging global partnerships with companies such as Visa, Ant Financial, PayPal, Microsoft, and Huawei, strengthening M-PESA\u2019s international profile and positioning Africa at the forefront of financial innovation.<\/p>\n<p>In a tweet on X, Lawyer Donald Kipkorir stated that\u00a0Sitoyo&#8217;s leadership at M-Pesa forever transformed the money markets in Kenya.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;My friend Sitoyo Lopokoiyit&#8217;s run as the M-Pesa Managing Director comes to an end! As William Shakespeare said:&#13;<br \/>\n&#13;<br \/>\n\u201cAll the world&#8217;s a stage, and all the men and women merely players; They have their exits and their entrances.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;His story of a Pokot boy leaving a village known for rustling cattle from my people, Marakwet, to bestride the financial sector in Kenya is a story of legends! As he closes one chapter &amp; opens a new one, I wish my friend GODSPEED!&#8221;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Sitoyo Lopokoiyit, Managing Director of M-PESA Africa Sitoyo Lopokoiyit, Managing Director of M-PESA Africa, will leave Safaricom on&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":277491,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[16],"tags":[156044,342,111,139,69,2737,30010,26910,136824,145,26911,156043,26909],"class_list":{"0":"post-277490","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-mobile","8":"tag-kenya-news","9":"tag-mobile","10":"tag-new-zealand","11":"tag-newzealand","12":"tag-nz","13":"tag-star","14":"tag-star-news","15":"tag-star-news-kenya","16":"tag-star-newspaper-kenya","17":"tag-technology","18":"tag-the-star","19":"tag-the-star-kenya","20":"tag-the-star-newspaper"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/277490","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=277490"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/277490\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/277491"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=277490"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=277490"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=277490"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}