Visa, _able, and Onafriq have partnered to expand access to credit through Visa Flex Credential across CEMEA.
According to the official press release, the partnership is intended to help financial institutions in the region activate credit experiences alongside their existing prepaid and debit card offerings.
Visa Flex Credential allows card issuers to link multiple funding sources, such as debit, prepaid, and credit, to a single card credential. Through the new collaboration, financial institutions may be able to extend credit access to customers using their existing eligible debit and prepaid credentials, without requiring a separate card product. According to the companies, the aim is to simplify the customer experience while supporting broader financial inclusion in markets where formal credit access remains limited.
_able's platform is intended to complement this by extending its existing credit enablement infrastructure, which is already deployed across banking and mobile money channels, to support card-based use cases. In addition, the company states that its platform helps financial institutions manage portfolio performance, risk management, liquidity optimisation, and customer growth initiatives.
Onafriq's processing role
Under the agreement, Onafriq will provide payment processing capabilities for eligible prepaid card implementations, connecting participating financial institutions to its pan-African payments infrastructure via its proprietary companion card platform, integrated with _able's system. This is designed to help extend Visa Flex Credential-enabled services in markets where participating issuers choose to deploy them.
For banks and issuers, the three companies state that the partnership is designed to simplify implementation by combining Visa's payment technology and network, _able's credit enablement infrastructure, and Onafriq's processing and payments delivery capabilities within a single collaboration framework.
Regional context
The companies note that debit and prepaid card adoption has grown across many African markets in recent years, while access to formal credit products has remained comparatively limited. The partnership is positioned as a way for issuers to use existing customer relationships and card credentials as a channel for offering additional financial services, rather than requiring new products or infrastructure.
_able is headquartered in Dubai, with an operational hub in Nairobi, a market and innovation hub in Dar es Salaam, and a technology and intelligence hub in Pune, and supports partners across several emerging markets in the region.
Financial institutions across CEMEA can now explore deploying Visa Flex Credential on their existing card portfolios via _able's platform, which is designed to operate across multiple processing environments to support adoption as it grows across participating markets.
