Available · NYSC Corper · Abia State

Wisdom
OkparajiData Scientist

ML Engineer Data Analyst Accountant Fintech

I build production ML systems for Nigerian fintech — combining rare dual expertise in accounting and data science. 15+ deployed applications. Targeting Kuda, Moniepoint, Flutterwave & more.

View Projects LinkedIn ↗ GitHub ↗

Deployed Projects

Best Accuracy %

Fintech Targets

2-in-1

DS + Accounting

Python· XGBoost· SHAP· PostgreSQL· dbt· FastAPI· MLflow· Streamlit· Gemini· RAG· DuckDB· scikit-learn· Python· XGBoost· SHAP· PostgreSQL· dbt· FastAPI· MLflow· Streamlit· Gemini· RAG· DuckDB· scikit-learn·

About Me

Where numbers
meet intelligence

I'm a Data Scientist, ML Engineer, and qualified Accountant — a rare combination that lets me build technically rigorous ML systems grounded in real financial domain knowledge.

Over the past year I've shipped 15+ production ML applications to Streamlit Cloud and Render — fraud detectors, credit scorers, NLP pipelines, RAG bots, and a full PostgreSQL + dbt data warehouse.

Currently serving as an NYSC Corps Member in Abia State, actively targeting a data science placement at a Nigerian fintech company where both skills create outsized impact.

Connect on LinkedIn GitHub Profile

Dual Expertise

Accounting degree meets ML engineering. Most data scientists lack financial depth; most accountants can't build ML systems. This profile does both — and that's rare in Nigerian fintech.

Production-first Mindset

Every project is deployed — Streamlit Cloud, Render, or GitHub Pages. Real URLs, real inference endpoints, real monitoring. Not just Jupyter notebooks.

Nigerian Fintech Focus

All projects are designed around Nigerian patterns — Naira volatility, Pidgin English, mobile-first banking, POS dominance, NIBSS transaction flows, and local fraud vectors.

Building in Public

Every project is documented and shared on GitHub (@Santandave961) and X. Transparent process, real code, real iteration — the way serious engineers work.

Portfolio

Production-Deployed
Projects

Featured

🛡️

Fraud Detection · ML

FraudGuard AI

Real-time Nigerian fintech fraud detection. XGBoost classifier with SHAP waterfall explanations, anomaly scoring pipeline, and a live inference REST API on FastAPI. Handles mobile money, POS, and bank transfer transaction patterns with explainable per-decision outputs.

XGBoostSHAP FastAPIStreamlit Scikit-learn

GitHub ↗ Demo ↗

💳

Credit Risk · ML

NaijaScore AI

Alternative credit scoring using mobile & transaction behaviour signals — no formal credit history required. Random Forest + SHAP explainability.

Random ForestSHAPCredit Risk

GitHub ↗

New

🏗️

Data Engineering

NaijaFintech Data Warehouse

PostgreSQL + dbt data warehouse on Nigerian banking transactions. Medallion architecture with MoM revenue analytics.

PostgreSQLdbtHuggingFace

GitHub ↗

🔍

NLP · LLM · RAG

DataLens AI

RAG + Text2SQL assistant. Ask natural language questions over financial datasets; get SQL + written insights via Gemini 1.5 Flash.

RAGGeminiText2SQL

GitHub ↗

📉

MLOps · Churn

ChurnOps AI

Production churn prediction with MLflow experiment tracking, model versioning, and a live Streamlit monitoring dashboard.

MLflowMLOpsXGBoost

GitHub ↗

💬

NLP · Sentiment

FinSentiment Nigeria

Pidgin English-aware sentiment analyser for Nigerian fintech social media and reviews. Custom NLP pipeline trained on Nigerian linguistic patterns — the only tool of its kind in the ecosystem.

NLPPidgin EnglishSentimentStreamlit

GitHub ↗

🏦

Financial Analytics

BankScan AI

Bank statement analyser that auto-categorises transactions, detects spending patterns, and generates financial health scores — accounting domain knowledge encoded into ML.

NLPpandasFinancial Analysis

GitHub ↗

📈

Forecasting

NairaScope AI

Naira/USD exchange rate forecasting dashboard tracking CBN policy impact and devaluation trends.

Time SeriesyfinancePlotly

GitHub ↗

🤖

LLM · Chatbot

Naira Wise AI

Gemini-powered Nigerian personal finance advisor chatbot. Understands Naira-denominated financial goals, local investment options, and Nigerian economic context. Built with google-genai SDK after migrating from deprecated google-generativeai package.

Geminigoogle-genaiChatbotStreamlit

GitHub ↗

😊

Computer Vision

EmotiScan AI

Real-time facial emotion recognition with DeepFace, OpenCV, and Grad-CAM visualisations.

DeepFaceOpenCVGrad-CAM

GitHub ↗

⚙️

Data Engineering

NaijaFintech ETL Pipeline

DuckDB-powered ETL pipeline ingesting Nigerian fintech data with transformation and loading layers.

DuckDBETLPython

GitHub ↗

🌐

API · Backend

NaijaBank API

FastAPI microservice for Nigerian banking data deployed on Render. RESTful endpoints for transaction analytics.

FastAPIRenderREST API

GitHub ↗

Experience

The
Journey

Building in public, shipping in production, bridging finance and data.

2024 – Present

NYSC Corps Member

National Youth Service Corps · Abia State, Nigeria

Serving as a data science and analytics professional under the NYSC programme.
Actively seeking PPA placement at a Nigerian fintech company for full-time data science work.
Continuously shipping ML systems, pipelines, and dashboards throughout the service year.
Outreach and placement proposals sent to Interswitch, AXA Mansard, and other fintech targets.

2023 – 2024

Independent ML Engineer & Data Scientist

Self-directed Portfolio · Remote, Nigeria

Designed, built, and deployed 15+ production ML applications for Nigerian fintech use cases.
Built fraud detection (XGBoost + SHAP), credit scoring, churn prediction, and RAG/LLM systems.
Constructed a full PostgreSQL + dbt data warehouse on Nigerian banking transactions.
All projects deployed to Streamlit Cloud and Render — live, accessible, production-grade.
Building in public on GitHub (@Santandave961) and X (@Santandave961).

Prior Experience

Accountant

Accounting Practice · Nigeria

Prepared financial statements, P&L reports, and balance sheets to accounting standards.
Performed reconciliations, ledger management, and audit support.
Applied budgeting and cost accounting skills to business financial planning.
Financial domain knowledge now directly applied to ML feature engineering and metric design.

2019 – 2023

BSc Accounting

University · Nigeria

Core accounting: Financial Reporting, Management Accounting, Auditing, Taxation, Corporate Finance.
Self-taught data science, ML, and deep learning alongside undergraduate degree.
Applied learning through fintech ML projects on GitHub throughout undergrad.

Contact

Let's build
something great
together.

Open to NYSC placement opportunities and data science roles at Nigerian fintech companies. I bring both the financial domain depth and the ML engineering capability your team needs.

github.com/Santandave961

santandave961.github.io

Location