Zambia’s President, Hakainde Hichilema, has travelled to Livingstone City to attend the Transform Africa Summit (TAS2023) in Victoria Falls, Zimbabwe. The invitation to attend the summit came from Zimbabwe’s President, Emmerson Dambudzo Mnangagwa. The summit opens officially on Wednesday, April 26, 2023, under the theme of “Connect, Innovate, Transform.”
More than 100 nations will attend, including government officials, companies, and organisations. The aim of the summit is to speed up the digital transformation of participating African countries, creating competitive, agile, open, and innovative smart societies.
The Minister of Technology and Science, Felix Mutati, who is also attending the summit, confirmed President Hichilema’s participation. He highlighted that the summit would focus on practical ways to promote transforming Africa into a fully digitised economy. The transformation would allow technology to be used to benefit integration, further advancing the commitment to transform Africa.
The summit is set to bring together Heads of State and Governments, First Ladies, Ministers of Information Communication and Technology, and top executives of Information Technology and Telecommunications companies. Women and girls in Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics (STEM), young entrepreneurs, and academics are also expected to attend.
In a related development, Fayaz King, the Assistant Secretary-General and Special Advisor for the United Nations Envoy on Technology, called for the need to connect schools to the internet. He noted that digital connectivity in schools was vital, particularly during the COVID-19 pandemic, where about 2.3 million children were not in school and only relied on the internet. King praised Zambia for participating in the programme to connect schools to the internet.
