Bayport Financial Planning

Bayport Financial Services is the leading provider of responsible unsecured credit in several African markets like South Africa, Uganda, Zambia, Ghana and Tanzania.  People in these countries benefit from Bayport financial planning expertise and gain access to hassle-free unsecured credit.  Bayport financial planning has empowered many people in Africa to take charge of the future.

Bayport believes that a society should be healthy and educated to function optimally and to move the country forward as a whole.  Therefore, Bayport is involved in many community projects in the countries where we are active.  The projects are often in the domains of education and public health services.

Ghana Financial Services does not believe in investing in communities for investment’s sake.  We believe that our assistance should empower the people of Ghana to develop themselves.  Therefore, we prefer to sponsor economically challenged individuals who display talent and determination.  Our Scholarship Award Scheme, established in 2007, aims to empower students who cannot afford further tuition, yet have performed exceptionally well in their studies.  Such a scholarship spans an eight-year period: the last four years of senior high school tuition and four years of tertiary education.  The scheme’s success has prompted Ghana Financial Services to award these scholarships on a permanent basis.  One student is selected per region, taken from nominations sent in by teachers.  Learners are required to excel at their BECE (Basic Education Certificate Examination) and they should come from an economically disadvantaged background.

We have community projects running in Tanzania as well and these focus mainly on primary education.  We have sponsored renovations at some of the regional offices of the Tanzanian Teachers’ Union.  Bayport has also made the 2008 Kinondoni primary schools athletic competition possible with a sponsorship of Tshs 7.6 million.  We also sponsored a one-day workshop for 150 teachers from Kinondoni in October 2008.  The renovation of the Airport Primary School buildings in Kigoma was a large project, involving Tshs 19.7 million.  The teaching facilities and buildings are much improved and include 265 new desks.

Similar to projects we run in Ghana, we also focus on disadvantaged learners in Tanzania, helping where we can to make it financially possible for gifted school pupils (without the economic means) to complete their school careers and their tertiary studies.  We are involved in a particularly touching project where we are assisting two albino sisters from Mwanza city who have fallen victim to severe discrimination, ridicule and physical assault because of their skin pigmentation.  Bayport is committed to cover the school fees and provide for the upkeep of both sisters.

Bayport has been an unusual success story, even amidst the global financial crisis, and this has been partly thanks to a brilliant management team.  Director of Bayport Management Limited (BML) and CEO of Bayport Financial Services Zambia is Justin Chola.  Justin has worked in the financial sphere in the United States and several African countries and brings with him a wealth of knowledge and experience of information technology and financial services.  He not only used to be manager of Enron Corporation’s South African operations, but he was the Zambian National Commercial Bank Limited’s Director for Information Technology and African Banking Corporation Limited’s Group Chief Operating Officer as well.  He has led Bayport’s Zambian operations to become the largest unsecured credit provider in the country.

Stuart Stone, BML’s Executive Director and joint CE of the Bayport Group, is a very successful chartered accountant and entrepreneur.  He was also a founding shareholder in Credit Direct (a joint venture with African Bank).  He later joined African Bank and eventually co-founded Bayport Management Limited with Grant Kurland.

Grant is currently the BML Chief Executive and joint CE of Bayport Group.  He had originally joined Nando’s in 1992, developing the franchise abroad and in Africa.  Seven years later, he joined micro-credit operation Credit Direct, which was acquired by African Bank, upon which Grant joined African bank, where he was head of sales and responsible for designing its mobile business and branch models.

The Bayport Financial Services success story continues as we grow our operations in Africa and South Africa, offering our Bayport financial planning expertise to thousands of people and empowering them with responsible, hassle-free access to unsecured credit.