To open up new opportunities, redefine leadership, and promote more intelligent decision-making, industry leaders throughout the continent have been urged by Kashifu Inuwa, Director General of the National Information Technology Development Agency (NITDA), to incorporate Artificial Intelligence (AI) into their business, organisational, and operational models. This will help to establish Africa as a global leader in AI-driven innovation.
This call was made by Inuwa at a panel discussion on “Harnessing AI for Strategic Leadership” at the Main State of GITEX Africa 2025 in Marrakech, Morocco.
Exploring how data-driven and intelligence-led initiatives may change business models, maximise resources, and open up new opportunities through AI-powered processes across several countries was the main goal of the panel discussion.
The DG promoted a people-first and strategy-led approach to AI development and governance, positioning Africa—and Nigeria in particular—as a growing force in the global AI landscape while addressing an international audience of investors, technologists, and policymakers.
According to the DG, executives need to become AI-driven and use technology as a collaborator in decision-making rather than merely a tool if they want to be successful in the fast-paced world of today.
“AI is shifting the skills we value today, as well as the processes we use to do our daily work, so to drive strategic leadership, you need to be an AI-driven leader and find a way to use AI as a tool to create co-intelligence whereby you bring people and computers to work together to deliver your strategic vision as a leader,” he noted.
Inuwa said, “Strategy must always come first, and technology second,” while stressing that executives should use AI in conjunction with their teams’ distinct talents to produce genuine economic value.
Inviting AI into the story, retaining human control, creating models with guardrails, and adopting a philosophy of continual development are the four guidelines he provided for using generative AI effectively.
According to Inuwa, AI is brought to the table by assigning it to organisational tasks, retaining human oversight to rectify bias and poor judgement, creating safeguards to ensure privacy ethics and inclusivity, and adopting a continuous improvement mindset by viewing the current state of AI as the least functional version available.
However, he cautioned against the dangers of using AI systems that are based on data that does not accurately reflect the variety of realities seen in global society. He emphasised that all cultures and residents must be digitally visible and warned that if data doesn’t notice a community, the system won’t see it either.
The Regulatory Intelligence Framework, which is based on the three pillars of awareness, intelligence, and dynamism, is the foundation of NITDA’s governance approach to AI regulation.
“In our approach to regulating AI in governance, we have a framework we call Regulatory Intelligence Framework, which as a regulator we need to be aware of the environment, we need to be dynamic because things change, and we also need to be intelligent. We need to know the data and make sense out of it,” he disclosed.
“Then we have 2 approaches, the first one is a rule-based where you can come up with certain guidelines and expect people to comply with them and we have a non-rule based, which allows them to build use cases, and based on those use cases, put the guard rails and agree on the best practices, which is always the best when it comes to AI governance,” he added
Inuwa outlined a bold vision for Africa’s AI future in the next five years, predicting that the continent will use AI to overcome practical problems across all economic sectors and close development gaps.
According to Inuwa, the continent may achieve previously unheard-of levels of creativity, efficiency, and inclusive growth by enhancing human potential with AI.
“We missed the first, second, and third industrial revolutions, but this fourth one, we must lead it and not just follow.” He concluded.
Other industry leaders who shared their experiences and insightful ideas at the panel session were the Special Envoy on Technology, Republic of Kenya, Philip Thigo, CEO Pesalink, Gituku Kirika, and the Head of Africa, Open AI, Emmanuel Lubanzadio.
