Selcom, NALA enter strategic partnership to ease money transfers in Tanzania

Selcom has entered a strategic partnership with NALA, a UK-based FinTech, that will facilitate the last-mile termination of incoming remittances into Tanzanian mobile wallets and bank accounts instantly in real-time.

The partnership with Selcom helps put NALA at the forefront of the ever-evolving remittance space both locally and globally.

This is owed in part to Selcom’s central role in the financial services ecosystem as an essential conduit in the industry, and in part to NALA’s superior product innovation and user experience.

With this partnership, NALA users in the UK and USA can now conveniently transfer money to several banks and mobile money wallets in Tanzania from the comfort of their homes, while enhancing the inflow of diaspora capital into Tanzania. 

In 2021, Tanzania received $570 million in remittances from its diaspora, up from $400 million in 2020. In 2022, Selcom looks forward to working closely with NALA, the government and other MTOs to grow inflows further for onward investment in sectors such as education, health and agriculture.

 Meanwhile, NALA continues to advance its mission of growing economic opportunity for Africa by building financial solutions with Africans at the core.

“We are pleased to partner with NALA, an established brand on a mission to increase opportunity on the African continent and for its diaspora around the world. Selcom’s state-of-the-art interoperability engine will be an invaluable and strategic addition to NALA’s community-powered financial solutions. Our partnership will enable NALA’s customers to send money on a transparent and efficient platform, significantly increasing NALA’s customer reach in Tanzania and creating a new delivery channel for the African diaspora to send money back home. This launch will offer unmatched convenience and flexibility to the Tanzanian diaspora across the UK and USA to send money home in real-time. I believe we are a bit late to the remittance services party but there is a lot of opportunity ahead. With the support of the Central Bank and partners such as NALA we look forward to making a noticeable impact.”Sameer Hirji, Executive Director, Selcom said.

Benjamin Fernandes, Founder and CEO of NALA said, “The partnership with Selcom is a signal of our intentions to deepen NALA’s presence in priority markets. As a Tanzanian, it brings me particular pleasure to invest in our country and its diaspora,”

He said Africa is the most expensive continent in the world to send money to, and NALA’s ambition is to shift that paradigm by creating financial solutions that Africans deserve.

“As we expand our product and reach, it becomes even more important to secure second-to-none partners to deliver on this ambition. Selcom’s position as a leading player in financial infrastructure places it at the center of financial innovation on the continent, creating the ingredients for a fruitful partnership. ” he added.

He added,”Selcom becomes the right choice for fintechs such as NALA; as Selcom is committed to building a global payment highway that interconnects financial institutions such as banks and mobile wallets seamlessly and with trust. Both companies believe that this pioneering partnership will break ground in the remittance industry in Tanzania and parallelly grow remittance uptake in the country,”