Nigerian Government, other African leaders need to be forward thinking with technology

So our African leaders did not deem it fit at the last United Nations assembly to talk about technology related issues.

The seventy-second session of the United Nations General Assembly was held on September 12, 2017 in New York city, USA.

It says a lot about the pedestal on which the continent places technology, because it really just seems like the African governments are only interested in technology related matters when it’s being used to put them in bad light.

That’s when you begin to see headlines relating to Internet shutdowns, threats to gag citizens’ freedom of speech and what have you.

This is not to say these African leaders are completely blind to the happenings around the technology space or that they are not trying to some extent to improve the people’s lives with technology.

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But we are asking them to show more vested interest in the tech ecosystem.

Terrorism, fake news, cyberbullying and cybercrime among others are global technology aided threats to humanity that world leaders are using opportunities like the UN assembly to address. The Nigerian health sector among others need urgent disruption as regards information management system, to name a few.

Not to undermine any other issue that Nigeria and other African countries may have brought up, technology is going to be a determinant and decisive factor - Artificial intelligence and robotics for example is at the heart of issues that will define the outlook of the future.

Arise Africa.