AYV News, July 2, 2026
Sierra Leone’s Chief Minister, Dr. David MoininaSengeh has called on Africa to leverage technology and education to transform the lives of the people stating that technology must be used to drive equity, not serve as a source of inequity.
The Chief Minister was delivering the keynote address at the 2026 inaugural Yidan Prize Africa Conference held at the Evasion Marine in Dakar, Senegal on the theme, Unleashing Africa’s Potential: The role of Education in a New Era of Development.
Focusing on how technology, specifically artificial intelligence help every child learn and reach his or her full human potential, or how it will leave the most excluded children even further behind. Dr. Sengehspoke on what he referred to as radical Inclusion in an era of Artificial Intelligence.
Bringing out the education gains in Sierra Leone, he referenced when he was appointed by President Julius Maada Bio as Sierra Leone’s first Chief Innovation Officer in 2018, “people asked us. Why are you talking about technology when children need books? Why are you talking about Al when teachers need training?” They were right he continued, “So we supplied books to over 3 million children, we recruited teachers and we trained over 20,000 of them. And they were also wrong. So we introduced tools like the “Result Checker” so parents didn’t have to pay lots of money and take a long time to know their children’s examination results”.
The Chief Minister further explained how they deployed hybrid learning and examination materials via mobile so that children can have access to learning materials that led to significantly improve educational outcomes. Also deployed the Whatsapp TeacherAichatbot that helped teachers and policy makers
Advancing the argument on AI, Dr. Sengeh was positive that it will help see invincible children in the school system, help teachers reach learners who are falling behind; help ministries know which schools need books, which children are absent, which communities are under-served and vulnerable to climate crisis, and which interventions are working.
Recently, in rural Sierra Leone, the Ministry of Basic and Senior Secondary Education authorized a randomized controlled trial with Google DeeMind and Fab Al, tracking 1,763 junior secondary students across 12 schools. A custom Socratic Al Guided Learning mode was integrated into teacher-led mathematics lessons. The Al did not simply give answers. It asked questions. It scaffolded. It protected critical thinking. In fact, it posed scaffolding questions in most of its messages and gave direct answers augmenting the teacher.
“So our task is clear. Al must not be something that happens to Africa. Al must be something Africa shapes itself and uses to serve our people. Technology must be at the service of people. Not the other way round”. The Chief Minister emphasised.
