A whole-of-government digital transformation agenda increasingly defines South Africa’s digital profile. The MyMzansi Digital Transformation Roadmap states that earlier state digitisation efforts were fragmented and sets out a shared model built around digital public infrastructure, including digital identity, interoperable data exchange, unified service channels, and phased implementation.
From AI talk to AI governance
On 2 April 2026, South Africa’s Cabinet published a draft national AI policy for public comment, marking a shift from exploratory discussions to formal governance design. The draft frames AI as both a driver of economic growth and a source of societal risk, requiring balanced oversight. It emphasises equitable distribution of benefits, protection of rights, and inclusive access to AI capabilities and skills. The policy also signals a stronger role for the state in guiding responsible adoption across sectors, while encouraging local innovation and industry development. It reflects a broader move to align AI governance with existing data protection, digital transformation, and development priorities.
The draft AI policy sits alongside the 2024 National Data and Cloud Policy, which treats data and cloud as strategic assets for service delivery, interoperability, privacy, and digital-economy development.
The Protection of Personal Information Act (POPIA) applies to both public and private bodies, creates minimum conditions for lawful processing, recognises rights related to unsolicited communications and automated decision-making, and regulates cross-border data flows. In parallel, the National Cybersecurity Policy Framework remains the core national cyber policy, while the Electronic Communications Act continues to anchor e-transactions, e-government, and much of the legal environment for e-commerce.
South Africa’s digital infrastructure is among the strongest in Africa. The government describes broadband as a national inclusion priority through SA Connect, the implementation arm of the country’s broadband policy, while the Department of Communications and Digital Technologies’ (DCDT) infrastructure roadmap highlights international cables, backbone networks, and last-mile access as the core stack. South Africa now has 9 international submarine cables landing on its coasts, and NAPAfrica describes itself as the largest Internet exchange on the African continent; the country also hosts major cloud infrastructure, including AWS Cape Town and Google Cloud Johannesburg.
The broader digital economy is regulated through a mix of competition, content, media, and infrastructure policy. South Africa’s long-standing Electronic Communications Act supports e-commerce and e-government, while current governance debates increasingly focus on platform power and online harms. In this context, the 2025 Draft White Paper on Audio and Audiovisual Media Services and Online Safety shows that online content governance is becoming a more explicit policy field, not just an extension of legacy broadcasting rules.
South Africa’s Permanent Mission to the UN in Geneva:
The Permanent Mission of South Africa in Geneva represents South Africa at the UN Office at Geneva and other international organisations in Switzerland. It engages with 44 international organisations in Switzerland and is responsible for advancing the South African government’s priorities in the multilateral system. In addition to diplomatic work, the mission also hosts a Consulate General that provides immigration, civic, and consular services for South African citizens in parts of Switzerland.
Consult South Africa’s AI and digital strategies and regulations
Here you can explore the country’s main digital strategies, laws, and regulations by simply asking the chatbot, which is designed to help you quickly find relevant documents and understand the country’s digital policy landscape.
Main digital policies and regulations in the country:
The Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) is advancing its digital transformation through the Plan National du Numérique Horizon 2025, launched in 2019. This strategy prioritizes infrastructure expansion, digital services, and improved governance. National fiber backbone projects, such as the Central African Backbone and 2Africa subsea cable landing, have expanded connectivity, while data centers like Raxio DRC1 and IXPs in Kinshasa, Lubumbashi, and Goma support growing internet traffic. Despite these developments, internet penetration remains low—around 27%—and access is uneven between urban and rural areas.
Cybersecurity and data protection frameworks have begun to take shape. The 2023 Digital Code defines personal data rights, mandates breach notifications, and outlines rules for cross-border transfers, though enforcement mechanisms remain limited. A national cybersecurity agency and data protection authority are legally established but not yet operational. Internet shutdowns during political unrest and outdated surveillance laws continue to pose risks to digital rights and service continuity.
E-commerce, AI, and emerging technologies are gradually gaining traction. Mobile money is expanding, though cash dominates online transactions. Startups in agriculture, logistics, and climate resilience are integrating AI tools, and the DRC has partnered with international initiatives to strengthen its innovation ecosystem. Challenges remain in regulation, logistics, and digital literacy, but ongoing investments and global cooperation are positioning the DRC for steady digital growth.
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On the demand side, China remains the largest online retail market globally: ¥15.42 trillion in online retail sales in 2023. The country also houses one of the biggest public cloud and data-centre footprints in Asia, underpinned by the national ‘Eastern Data, Western Computing’ program: by mid-2024, authorities cited ¥43.5 billion (US$6.1 billion) invested in eight computing hubs, with industry reporting ~1.95 million racks installed.
China has moved early on AI governance in emerging technologies while scaling domestic services: regulators reported 346 generative-AI services on file by 31 March 2025. These digital capabilities ride on extensive backbone networks and international links, and policy continues to prioritise compute build-out, even as officials work to improve utilisation across data-centre capacity added in recent years.
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The Central African Republic (CAR) stands out globally for its early experimentation with cryptoassets. It is one of only a few countries worldwide to have made Bitcoin legal tender, through its 2022 cryptocurrency law, and it has gone further with a tokenisation law that allows land and natural resources to be represented on a national blockchain platform (Sango). In the regional context, this places CAR among the most aggressive regulators in formalising crypto transactions in law, even if practical uptake remains limited and the macro-economic risks are significant.
Within Central Africa, CAR has also moved quickly on the normative side of digital governance. In 2024, it adopted both a comprehensive personal data protection law and a cybersecurity/cybercrime law, establishing a dedicated data protection authority and a national cybersecurity agency. Combined with its 2018 electronic communications law and 2022 e-transactions law, this provides CAR with one of the more comprehensive digital legal frameworks among low-income, conflict-affected states in the region, although institutional capacity and enforcement are still in their early stages.
CAR still lags behind in basic connectivity, but for a landlocked, low-income country, it has built a surprisingly solid digital backbone. The Central African Backbone and national fibre network now link Bangui to regional submarine cables, supported by a national data centre and digital training centre. Alongside a new digital development agency and World Bank-backed reforms for public data management, this gives CAR a relatively well-structured core digital infrastructure, despite persistent gaps in last-mile access, electricity and affordability.
Despite modest overall rankings, Eswatini stands out regionally in several digital adoption metrics. Internet penetration reached about 57–58 percent of the population by early 2025. surpassing the African average of approximately 39 percent. Additionally, roughly 52 percent of the top 1,000 websites are locally served from in‑country caches or servers—exceeding the Internet Society’s 50 percent benchmark and significantly outperforming the regional average of 33 percent.
On the digital infrastructure and innovation front, Eswatini exhibits noteworthy strengths. It ranks second in Africa (after South Africa) in terms of internet speed, leading the region. According to the Network Readiness Index (NRI) 2023, the country ranks globally 6th for mobile apps development, 47th for firms with websites, and 49th for internet access in schools—highlighting leadership in these specific sub‑pillars.
Overall, Eswatini’s digital ecosystem reflects a mixed performance: while the country achieves above‑average results in areas such as internet usage, content localisation, speed, and digital education uptake, broader gaps remain, particularly in emerging technology investment, e‑participation, and international bandwidth infrastructure.
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Türkiye’s network footprint is unusually strong for a regional crossroads. Multiple Mediterranean/Black Sea cable landings feed dense metro interconnection, anchored by DE-CIX Istanbul, which positions the country as a bridge between Europe, Central Asia and the Middle East. In October 2025, Türkiye concluded a nationwide 5G spectrum tender (700 MHz and 3.5 GHz), with commercial service scheduled to start on 1 April 2026, a timeline that aligns it with leading regional roll-outs.
Regarding services and payments, the state e-Devlet gateway centralises access to hundreds of public services and is operated by the Presidency’s Digital Transformation Office with Türksat, an integrated model common to top regional performers. Meanwhile, the central bank’s FAST rail provides 24/7 instant payments with funds available within seconds, underpinning modern checkout and P2P experiences across providers.
Governance and trust frameworks have tightened markedly. Türkiye is executing a National Cyber Security Strategy and Action Plan 2024–2028 and, in March 2025, enacted a Comprehensive Cybersecurity Law (No. 7545) that centralises responsibilities for critical-sector protection. Data flows are supported by updated KVKK rules, including a By-Law and Standard Contracts (July 2024) for cross-border transfers. The .tr namespace now runs on TRABİS, BTK’s real-time registry. These measures put Türkiye near the regional frontier on practical enablers: resilient interconnection, imminent 5G, instant payments, and a modernised security and data framework.
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In skills and innovation, BiH performs relatively well regionally. Universities supply a consistent stream of ICT graduates, and recent AI-ecosystem mappings show a growing cluster of small AI firms and research groups. For its size, the country maintains a stronger-than-expected base of digital talent.
BiH also shows emerging strengths in cloud and telecom-enabled digitalisation. The state has deployed a government cloud platform, and BH Telecom’s cooperation with AWS supports broader adoption of cloud and AI services. International programmes further position BiH to benefit from regional digital infrastructure and SME-digitalisation investments.
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Libya’s connectivity adoption is relatively high by regional standards: the World Bank/ITU series reports ~88% of the population using the internet in 2023 (upper tier among MENA peers). Mobile connectivity is also widespread; one World Bank-sourced series reports ~193 mobile subscriptions per 100 people (2022), a level typical of high multi-SIM usage rather than unique coverage.
On international infrastructure, Libya is a notable Mediterranean landing geography. Sector reporting notes that Libya has landed four submarine cable systems, including EIG, the Italy–Libya cable, Silphium, and the domestic LFON coastal system. The Medusa system is planned to land in Tripoli and Benghazi (reported target: by the end of 2025) via LUIC/LPTIC. At the same time, Internet Society Pulse reports no active IXPs and only ~3% locally cached content, which can limit performance/resilience even when international capacity improves.
