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27Sep

FIFAfrica26 Agenda Reveals Africa’s Tech Ecosystem is Keeping in Tandem With Global Strides

Author CIPESA Posted on

By FIFAfrica |

The Forum on Internet Freedom in Africa (FIFAfrica) has evolved in tandem with the prevailing concerns related to the internet in Africa. At its inception in 2014, discourse centred around who is connected and how to access information. While this remains pertinent today, Africa’s digital ecosystem has become far more complex.

This year, the Forum is hosted by the Collaboration on International ICT Policy in East and Southern Africa (CIPESA) in partnership with Mauritius-based Halley Movement Coalition. The keynote speech will be delivered by the Minister of Information Technology, Communication and Innovation of Mauritius.

FIFAfrica has become one of the continent’s most important convening spaces for shaping debate on digital rights, internet governance, and civic freedoms. Its continued relevance lies in its ability to remain closely attuned to the changing realities of Africa’s digital landscape, since its inception in 2014.

Within Africa’s digital rights ecosystem, the Forum serves the strategic function of connecting research, advocacy, policymaking, movement building, and public interest engagement in one forum. FIFAfrica is particularly significant because it places African digital rights interests within wider global conversations on technology governance, including for the Internet Government Forum (IGF), the World Summit on the Information Society (WSIS), and numerous others. At a time when decisions on Artificial Intelligence (AI), digital public infrastructure, content moderation, cross-border data governance, and online freedoms are increasingly shaped through international processes, FIFAfrica positions African stakeholders to contribute evidence and shape narratives in ways that are rooted in the continent’s own political, economic, and social contexts.

The four-day Forum kicks off with two days of 18 pre-events, followed by two days of the main programme which features 41 stand-out sessions, with participants from across Africa and beyond. The Forum has eight thematic areas covering digital democracy and civic participation, data governance and sovereignty, AI and emerging technologies, platform accountability, digital inclusion, digital economy and trade, movement building, and digital security and safety.

The agenda is built out of a selection of submissions received from more than 450 proposals received via a public call for sessions and travel support. The diversity of sessions submitted and selected is a reflection of the multiplicity of issues that the African tech ecosystem needs to address, many of which cannot be addressed in isolation. Questions about human rights and democracy increasingly intersect with technology and information. Meanwhile, data governance is tied to economic interests, while AI raises questions about exploitation, information integrity, access to information, and discrimination.

There will be strategic engagement between regulators, parliamentarians and the judiciary from across Africa on the Malabo Convention in a session hosted by Mzalendo Trust in partnership with CIPESA and the African Parliamentary Network on Internet Governance (APNIG). Further sessions engaging National Human Rights Institutions (NHRIs) on human rights and technology will be hosted by the Danish Human Rights Institute in partnership with CIPESA and the International Commission of Jurists (ICJ). The Forum will also serve as the host of the pre-launch of the Copenhagen Principles for the Protection of Human Rights in the Digital Age.

Meanwhile, AI remains a focus area of discussion due to its intersection with data protection, worker rights, access to information, information integrity, and democracy. Entities including Digital Action, the Global Center on AI Governance, the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF), the African Internet Rights Alliance (AIRA), the Digital Rights Alliance of Africa (DRAA), BBC Media Action, UNESCO, Article 19, Lighthouse Reports, Africa Uncensored, the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, and the Oversight Board will explore these concerns, including through the lens of child online safety, migration, media regulation, digital markets, and digital democracy. 

Further sessions entail discussions on the state of data governance, civic space, strategic litigation, technology and human rights, digital identity, DPI, gender and civic participation as part of broader debates on data, power and emerging technologies. Speakers will be drawn from entities such as Oxfam, Pan African Lawyers Union (PALU), and the Digital Impact Alliance (DIAL).

Platform accountability is also a key area of interest, including how it can be humanised, while sessions on corporate power and the push-back against internet shutdowns will involve speakers from Nguvu Collective, Lumate, and the Oversight Lab. Long-term FIFAfrica partner, Access Now, will host a session marking a decade of the #KeepItOn campaign. Internet shutdowns remain key violations of freedom of expression and access to information on the continent and also have significant economic and infrastructural consequences.

For years, platform regulation has often been framed around content moderation and how platforms should respond to harmful content. However, various FIFAfrica26 sessions are extending the debate into how platforms collect and use data, how they design recommendation and advertising systems, how they assess risk, how they respond to government demands, how they conduct due diligence, and what remedies they provide to people harmed by their systems. This is particularly important in Africa, where the global scale of technology companies is vastly greater than the capacity of national regulators and courts to scrutinise them. Entities such as CIPESA, GIZ, the Oversight Board, and EFF will host sessions challenging these narratives.

Sessions at the Forum will also reflect on shrinking civic space online and offline across the continent, including learnings from the cancellation of Rightscon and the rise in authoritarian practices across the continent. These will be candidly addressed by Access Now, RightsCon, and Amnesty International.

Practical sessions also form part of the agenda, with Masakhane, International Research & Exchanges Board (IREX) and the Human Rights Foundation (HRF) each hosting skills workshops on Safety By Design for African tech ecosystems, AI and languages, as well as Bitcoin as a tool for human rights activism and civil society respectively.

FIFAfrica26 continues in its path of inclusion and will entail language interpretation and adherence to a code of conduct that encourages active participation and contribution online and offline.

25Sep

Mauritius Set to Host Africa’s Leading Internet Freedom Forum as Country Enters a New Digital Transformation Phase

Author CIPESA Posted on

FIFAfrica26 |

Mauritius is the meeting point for some of Africa’s most pressing conversations about technology, rights and digital governance as the annual Forum on Internet Freedom in Africa 2026 (FIFAfrica26) takes place from September 28 to October 1, 2026 at the InterContinental Resort in Balaclava.

The Forum is set to be opened by Dr. Avinash Ramtohul, Minister of Information Technology, Communication and Innovation (Mauritius).

The 13th edition of FIFAfrica is hosted by the Collaboration on International Policy for East and Southern Africa (CIPESA) in partnership with Mauritius-based Halley Movement Coalition. Previous editions have been held in Ethiopia, Ghana, Namibia, Senegal, South Africa, Tanzania, Uganda, and Zambia.

More than 500 participants from across Africa and beyond, including policymakers, technology practitioners, researchers, journalists, civil society organisations, private sector actors and digital rights advocates are set to attend the event (in person and virtually). Attendees will address data governance and sovereignty; Artificial Intelligence (AI) and emerging technologies; platform accountability; digital inclusion; the digital economy and trade; digital democracy and civic participation; and digital security and safety.

Mauritius was selected as the host for the 2026 edition as it is Africa’s most stable democracy, with strong rule of law and robust protection for freedom of expression, both offline and online. The country is also a pioneer in technology-driven governance and digital transformation. The country offers a space for policy-oriented discussions on data governance, regulation of AI, platform accountability, and digital trade within a context that is progressively navigating these transitions.

Dr. Wairagala Wakabi, CIPESA’s Executive Director stated that, “The Forum creates an opportunity for Mauritian perspectives to enter a broader African conversation at a time when countries across the continent are making consequential decisions about the technologies and systems that will shape their societies. Mauritius brings its experiences and learning from policies to the continental table, while participants from across Africa bring questions about digital inclusion, regulation, innovation, civic participation ,and digital rights.”

The Forum comes at a significant moment for Mauritius as the country is implementing its Digital Transformation Blueprint 2025–2029, which identifies digital public infrastructure, digital skills, private sector innovation, cyber resilience, data governance and AIas key components of its digital transformation agenda. In April, Mauritius also launched its National AI Strategy and FAIR Guidelines, setting out principles around fairness, accountability, inclusiveness, integrity and responsibility in the development and use of AI. The FIFAfrica agenda reflects many of these developments and how they are being engaged with across Africa.

Mahendranath Busgopaul, the Halley Movement Secretary General,  notes that, “Africa’s digital future is one that we have to put in effort to shape. The decisions that we make about digital transformation, inclusion, protection and access will determine what kind of digital societies we will have in the future. Hosting FIFAfrica26 in Mauritius gives us an opportunity to bring our experiences to the continental conversation, learn from others, and collectively shape a digital future that is responsive to the diversity of the continent.”

Across Africa, the expansion of digital access and services has resulted in concerns around privacy, cybersecurity, access, accountability and trust. It is within this evolving landscape that FIFAfrica26 will explore what responsible digital transformation should look like for the people who use, depend on and are affected by digital technologies every day.

FIFAfrica26 will begin with pre-event activities on 28 and 29 September 28 and 29, followed by the main Forum on September and October 1, 2026 at the InterContinental Resort, Balaclava, Mauritius.

About the co-hosts of FIFAfrica26

CIPESA: CIPESA works to defend and expand the digital civic space to enable the protection and promotion of human rights and to enhance innovation and sustainable development.  CIPESA’s work responds to a shortage of information, research, resources and actors consistently working at the nexus of technology, human rights and society. Indeed, CIPESA’s establishment in 2004 was in response to the findings of the Louder Voices Report for DFiD, which cited the lack of easy, affordable and timely access to information about ICT-related issues and processes as key barriers to effective and inclusive ICT policy making in Africa.

Since 2014, CIPESA has convened FIFAfrica in collaboration with government ministries, international agencies and local partners. It has built each edition through partnerships that reflect the priorities, realities and emerging challenges of Africa’s digital societies. Visit the website

Halley Movement Coalition: The Halley Movement was founded in 1989 and is the lead organisation for the Mauritius Internet Governance Forum & Africa-Indian Ocean Island States IGF. The Movement is a coalition of charitable organisations that works in partnership with the private sector, governmental institutions and other international and national organisations.  Visit the website

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24Sep

CIPESA Weighs in on Kenya’s Draft Guidance Notes on AI and Emerging Technologies

Author CIPESA Posted on

By Raylenne Kambua |

The Collaboration on International ICT Policy for East and Southern Africa (CIPESA) submitted comments on two draft Guidance Notes that Kenya’s Office of the Data Protection Commissioner (ODPC) opened for public participation: one on Artificial Intelligence (AI), and another on Emerging Technologies.

The draft Notes provide guidance to entities on how to make sure their AI systems and emerging technologies comply with the Data Protection Act, 2019. While this is a positive step toward the responsible adoption and deployment of AI and emerging technologies, CIPESA highlights gaps the ODPC should address to ensure these technologies are governed in a rights-respecting, transparent, and accountable manner.

CIPESA’s Comments on the Draft Guidance Note on AI

A first set of concerns relates to how the AI Note fits with other legal frameworks. The Note cites only national laws, yet AI in Kenya operates within a wider regional and international framework, which risks regulatory inconsistency. Continental frameworks such as the AU Continental AI strategy, the African Union Convention on Cyber Security and Personal Data Protection (Malabo Convention) and the AU Data Policy Framework offer guidance on AI development and harmonised data governance.

The Note requires entities to conduct adequacy assessments before transferring AI-processed personal data across borders. Although intended to protect privacy, this requirement could trigger blanket data localisation and impede cross-border AI inference and cloud computing capabilities. CIPESA recommends aligning these assessments with the AU Data Policy Framework and the African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA) Protocol on Digital Trade to balance privacy safeguards with Africa’s digital trade ambitions.

As AI is increasingly deployed as an assistive technology, it risks excluding persons with disabilities when training data and biometric information are developed without their input. CIPESA observes that the Note omits Article 54 of the Constitution of Kenya, which protects persons with disabilities. Incorporating this provision would align the guidance with other standards, which set a benchmark for how regulation can protect groups that AI systems often overlook.

Furthermore, the draft Note lacks cross-references to the ODPC’s 2025 Guidance Note for Processing Children’s Data, and the Children Act, 2022, which enforces online protection and the best-interest principle for minors. This shortcoming creates disharmony among related efforts on children’s protection.

The submission points to the 2025 High Court judgment against Worldcoin, which found that iris data from hundreds of thousands of Kenyans was processed without a Data Protection Impact Assessment (DPIA). The Note’s biometric provisions prohibit only real-time surveillance without legal authority. This leaves retrospective analysis of stored facial or iris images unregulated, even though it carries equivalent privacy risks. CIPESA advocates mandatory pre-deployment registration with the ODPC and submission of DPIAs before any biometric data processing begins.

As generative AI spreads, so do its risks, such as hallucination. CIPESA recommends implementing verifiable content records and labelling requirements, such as watermarking or equivalent disclosure, for synthetic media used in decisions affecting individuals. This aligns with constitutional consumer rights under Article 46 and supports digital trust in continental trade involving automated electronic services covered by the AfCFTA Digital Trade Protocol.

The AI shaping Kenyans’ daily consumption centres around algorithmic feeds rather than enterprise chatbots. CIPESA argues that if AI laws regulate only technical enterprise tools while ignoring social media algorithms and content curation systems, they risk missing the AI that mostly shapes consumers’ public discourse. Global and local platforms that process Kenyan users’ data must also be subject to algorithmic governance and regular audits.

CIPESA also notes that the Note’s high-risk AI table omits information systems deployed in political and electoral environments. This is despite political opinion being classified as sensitive personal data under major data protection laws, and the AI Bill, 2026 addressing synthetic political content. CIPESA recommends adding categories for AI in political communication, voter micro-targeting, and synthetic political media ahead of the 2027 general election.

Other recommendations concern who the rules protect and who they hold to account. Kenya’s data annotators, content moderators, and reinforcement learning from human feedback (RLHF) workers help train both local and foreign AI models. However, the Note’s obligations focus entirely on end-user rights. CIPESA calls for extending data protection rights to this workforce, including protections over performance and monitoring data collected about them.

The Note requires entities to register with the ODPC as data controllers or processors before deploying any AI system that processes personal data. However, it does not address the separate Commissioner-maintained public register of high-risk AI models that is proposed under the AI Bill, 2026. CIPESA recommends clarifying how registration functions will be divided between the ODPC and the prospective AI Commissioner.

Regarding Digital Public Infrastructure such as interoperable digital identity systems, the Social Health Authority’s premium assessments, and the Kenya Revenue Authority’s automated eTIMS processes, CIPESA advises mandatory pre-deployment DPIAs, equity assessments before deployment, publicly disclosed methodologies, and human review guarantees.

Finally, AI governance is incomplete if it regulates companies but leaves government and security agencies outside meaningful oversight and accountability. CIPESA warns that without accountability for state use of AI in public services and surveillance, critical systems remain unmonitored. Citizens should be able to challenge public sector AI decisions just as they can challenge those of private entities.

CIPESA’s Comments on the Draft Guidance Note on Emerging Technologies

CIPESA also submitted comments on the Draft Guidance Note on Emerging Technologies. On cloud computing, it cautions that restricting systems tied to “the strategic interests of the state” risks becoming a de facto data localisation rule. CIPESA recommends confining data localisation to cases where a specific statutory requirement applies, in line with the AfCFTA Digital Trade Protocol and the AU Data Policy Framework’s emphasis on responsible intra-African data flows.

The submission advocates a complete prohibition on real-time remote biometric identification and indiscriminate mass surveillance in public spaces. It warns against using biometric categorisation to infer sensitive traits, alongside AI-based emotion recognition in schools and workplaces. Law enforcement remote biometric identification must require legal authorisation, judicial warrant, and independent oversight.

To strengthen impact assessments, CIPESA suggests publishing executive summaries of all DPIAs, excluding trade secrets, on a public High-Risk Technology Register before deployment. This would improve transparency and accountability and build public trust in high-risk emerging technology deployments.

Concerning automated decisions, CIPESA recommends meaningful human review by a reviewer with real authority to overturn or modify the outcome, not a rubber stamp. This should apply specifically to decisions on employment, credit, insurance, healthcare, social protection, immigration, and policing. To reduce the compliance burden, CIPESA recommends simplified registration and DPIA templates.

Building on CIPESA’s Wider Work on Kenya’s AI Governance

The two submissions follow CIPESA’s August 2026 submission on the Draft Kenya AI and Other Emerging Technologies Policy, which raised similar concerns about institutional independence and biometric safeguards at the policy level. They also draw on the Navigating the Implications of AI on Digital Democracy in Kenya report and its regional companion. The AI Guidance Note’s argument on algorithmic feeds echoes Kenya Doesn’t Have an AI Regulation Gap, It Has an Accountability Gap and Who Holds Digital Power Accountable? Lessons from Platform Governance in Africa.

Read CIPESA’s full comments on the Draft Guidance Notes on AI here and on Emerging Technologies here.

23Sep

It’s Almost Time For FIFAfrica26! Discover the Agenda. Meet the Speakers

Author CIPESA Posted on

By FIFAfrica |

This time next week, FIFAfrica26 will be underway in Mauritius!

The conversations we have been planning, the ideas we have been shaping, and the connections we have been looking forward to will finally shift into actions, debates, and new learning!

Across four days, FIFAfrica26 will bring together conversations on digital democracy and civic participation, AI and emerging technologies, data governance and sovereignty, platform accountability, digital inclusion, digital economy and trade, movement building, and digital security and safety.

Here is what you can look forward to:

  • Two days of engaging pre-event sessions (Be sure to sign up, as spaces are limited!)
  • Two days of an action-packed main event agenda, with in-depth sessions featuring speakers from across Africa and beyond. Be sure to explore the Agenda and meet the Speakers!
  • A Digital Rights Fun Run – come ready with your running shoes!
  • A Digital Reality Walk through Paths, Traps and Safe Passages.
  • An exhibition where you can discover new work, explore resources and meet the people behind some of the amazing digital rights work happening across the continent.

FIFAfrica is a unique opportunity to discover new work and organisations, exchange ideas and insights, make connections, and encounter conversations that expand how you think about the digital rights ecosystem. There will be plenty of opportunities to connect, contribute and make FIFAfrica26 your own.

Visit the FIFAfrica website for more information.

21Sep

African Lawyers Must Move From Using AI to Shaping its Governance

Author CIPESA Posted on

By Patricia Ainembabazi |

Artificial Intelligence (AI) is rapidly changing legal practice, presenting challenges for effective and accountable governance, professional responsibility, and the protection of clients’ rights and interests. Lawyers must develop institutional capabilities and learn how to verify AI-generated legal research and evidence, protect confidential information, challenge harmful automated decisions, and participate in shaping the policies governing these technologies.

These issues were at the heart of the AI Masterclass held during the 2026 Pan African Lawyers Union (PALU) Conference in Cairo, Egypt, themed “The African Lawyer in the Age of AI”. The masterclass was convened by the Collaboration on International ICT Policy for East and Southern Africa (CIPESA) and the African Legal Information Institute (African LII).

The discussions recognised that AI competence is increasingly becoming part of professional responsibility. Lawyers are already using AI for research, legal drafting and review, due diligence, and case preparation. However, while these tools can improve efficiency, they also introduce risks around confidentiality, legal privilege, client data, hallucinated authorities, intellectual property, bias and professional negligence.

Through a practical exercise involving an AI-generated legal opinion containing fabricated authorities and unsupported conclusions, participants considered a fundamental professional principle: “the lawyer remains responsible for the work, even where AI assisted in producing it”.

The session consequently emphasised a source-first approach to AI-assisted legal research. The African LII and National Legal Information Institutes (LIIs) provide authoritative primary legal sources that lawyers can use to ground and verify AI-generated analysis.

Participants explored a workflow that starts by locating the relevant primary law, providing authoritative source material to an AI tool, constructing a controlled legal prompt, and then checking the response against the original source. This approach is particularly important in jurisdictions where legal information may be fragmented and general-purpose AI systems may produce incomplete, outdated, or fabricated legal authorities.

The Cairo AI masterclass builds on CIPESA’s efforts to enhance the capacity of legal practitioners in technology governance and digital rights. Indeed, as part of the upcoming Forum on Internet Freedom in Africa (FIFAfrica26) slated for September 28 – October 1, 2026, in Mauritius, CIPESA and PALU will convene a litigation surgery and a session on how Bar Associations can champion internet freedom in Africa.

The AfricanLII, CIPESA and PALU masterclass reinforced AI literacy and professionalism for lawyers. Already, AfricanLII has trained more than 400 lawyers from across the continent on AI, including in Dakar, Abidjan, Accra and Dar es Salaam.

Beyond responsible use of AI, the masterclass addressed how lawyers can respond when algorithmic systems contribute to discriminatory decisions, unlawful biometric surveillance, technology-facilitated gender-based violence, exclusion from public services and opaque algorithmic scoring. This raised emerging litigation questions around access to algorithmic evidence, explainability, discovery and disclosure, expert evidence, jurisdiction, liability and appropriate remedies.

The evidentiary implications are equally significant. Deepfakes, fabricated documents, and synthetic media complicate traditional assumptions about the authenticity and reliability of evidence. Lawyers will increasingly need to interrogate provenance, authentication and admissibility when AI-generated or manipulated material enters the evidentiary record.

The masterclass connected these practical challenges to Africa’s wider regulatory environment. Its central proposition was that lawyers should not wait for comprehensive AI legislation before engaging with AI governance processes. Existing laws, such as those on data protection, already regulate significant aspects of AI use, while gaps in those frameworks create new opportunities for legal practice, litigation and policy advocacy. Lawyers must therefore be present not only in courtrooms but also in the policy processes where the rules governing AI are being designed.

The deliberations identified priorities for law firms, bar associations, judiciaries, governments and civil society organisations. They include continuing professional development, model AI-use policies, strategic litigation, judicial guidance, regulatory engagement, procurement transparency and stronger collaboration between lawyers and technologists.

The masterclass pointed to seven practical actions for African lawyers and bar associations:

  1. Develop professional AI-use policies for law firms and bar associations with clear guidance on confidentiality, privilege, client data, verification of AI-generated work, professional supervision, and responsibility for AI-assisted legal advice.
  2. Adopt source-first AI-assisted legal research, where AI outputs do not substitute authoritative legal sources. Lawyers should ground prompts in primary law and independently verify propositions, citations and authorities before relying on them.
  3. Bar associations should engage judiciaries and public institutions on procurement transparency, human oversight, data governance, evidentiary integrity and mechanisms for challenging AI-assisted decisions.
  4. Lawyers should begin testing existing constitutional, administrative, data protection and other legal remedies through litigation where algorithmic systems affect rights, while developing strategies for obtaining and interrogating algorithmic evidence.
  1. Lawyers and bar associations should monitor national AI strategies and regulatory consultations, make coordinated submissions and ensure that emerging policy frameworks incorporate human rights, due process, transparency, accountability and access to remedy.
  2. Bar associations, law societies and African legal-policy organisations should seek representation in processes such as the UN Global Dialogue on AI Governance, AI for Good, the Internet Governance Forum, the Africa AI Governance Summit and specialist law-and-governance conferences.
  3. African lawyers should, beyond attending conferences, submit proposals, contribute evidence from African jurisdictions, shape standards and negotiating positions, and build coalitions capable of translating global principles into enforceable domestic and regional safeguards.

Ultimately, the masterclass demonstrated that lawyers have a role throughout the AI lifecycle: advising on responsible use, assessing legal and rights risks, challenging harmful systems, scrutinising AI-generated evidence, shaping procurement safeguards, and participating in policy and regulatory processes.

The key issue facing the African legal profession is no longer whether lawyers will encounter AI within their practice. It is whether the profession will simply use technologies and operate under rules designed by others or actively shape how AI is deployed and governed across the continent.

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