L-R: Thaibat Adeniran, former Managing Director, Hilal Takaful Insurance Ltd; Mr Johnson Chukwuma, Keynote Speaker/founder & Managing Director, Cowry Asset Management Ltd; Alhaji (Dr). Umaru Kwairanga, Chairman of Occasion/Group Chairman, Nigerian Exchange Group; Ngozi Onyakusi, Convener & Publisher/CEO, SUPERNEWS Nigeria; Ayokunle Olubunmi, Head, Financial Institutions Ratings, Augusto & Co; Adeola Adewumi-Zer, Founder/CEO, ZER Consulting Africa and Uju Ogubunka, National President, Bank Customers Association of Nigeria, during the AI Artificial Intelligence ’25 conference organised by SUPERNEWS with the theme: Power of AI: enhancing efficiency and customer satisfaction for better financial services experience in Lagos.
SPEECH BY THE GROUP CHAIRMAN NGX, ALHAJI (DR.) UMARU KWAIRANGA AT THE SUPERNEWS 2025 ARTIFICIAL INTELLIEGENCE CONFERENCE
It is a privilege and an honour to join you today at this important dialogue on Artificial Intelligence in financial services, convened by SuperNews.
I congratulate the organisers for creating this vital platform that brings together key stakeholders to explore how emerging technologies are shaping the future of our industry.
Also, I commend them for identifying and focusing on AI which has been the most prominent concept in technology in the last couple of years.
By doing so, they have identified an area that many believe will be the basis for the next great leap in global and human development, just like the steam engine and the Internet. Such concepts often determine the trajectory of development and capital accumulation and those who are quick to adopt and master them are most likely to be the leaders of the future.
The theme of this year’s conference is the Power of AI: Enhancing Efficiency and Customer Satisfaction for Better Financial Services Experience. The theme focuses on how AI can be used to improve services in our financial services sector.
From recent statistics released by the National Bureau of Statistics, the services sector is the driver of Nigeria’s economy and the financial services sub sector is the most active in that sector. It is doing well in many ways but most of us here will agree that there is still plenty of room for improvement.
A lot of that improvement can come through utilisation of artificial intelligence and that is what the erudite speaker and panelists we have here today will be speaking on. I believe we will hear not just about the uses and benefits of AI in the financial services sector but also how we can overcome peculiar Nigerian problems such as power scarcity, data availability and capital needs and ensure that our sector and the Nigerian economy is at the leading edge of this next revolution in business.
We have a distinguished set of discussants for this year’s conference with Mr. Johnson Chukwu, a seasoned banking and capital market executive as the keynote speaker. Mr. Chukwu’s analysis are always lucid and enlightening and I do not expect any less today.
We are also privileged to have our regulators, the Commissioner of Insurance and Chief Executive Officer of the National Insurance Commission, Olusegun Ayo Omosehin, and the Director General of the Pension Commission, Mrs. Omolola Oloworaran to provide insights into the enabling frameworks for artificial intelligence in the financial services sector.
We also have distinguished panelists selected from the operators, the customers and users, as well as the expert consultants to give us a rounded view of how artificial intelligence can be used to enhance efficiency and customer satisfaction in the financial services.
With such a rich table, I am confident that we are in for an interesting and educating time and I invite you all to listen attentively and participate actively.
