The Smart Africa Alliance secretariat has announced Zimbabwe as the host of the sixth edition of the Transform Africa Summit which is set for 26 to 28 April this year.
The event, which takes the format of a confex since it includes an exhibition, is set to be held at the Elephant Hills Hotel in the resort city of Victoria Falls.
In a statement on the event’s website, the Smart Africa Alliance secretariat highlighted that the summit is set to be held under the theme, “Connect, Innovate and Transform.”
“Following five successful editions, the sixth Summit will take place at Victoria Falls in Zimbabwe.
“Transform Africa Summit aims to enable Member States to become more competitive, agile, open and innovative smart economies. It is an opportunity for meaningful engagements on how governments can attract large-scale investments and enable fast growth and exports as well as for the private sector to thrive in an innovation and ICT-driven entrepreneurship ecosystem, hence transform African nations into smart societies,” Transform Africa explained.
The event is set to be attended by Ministers in ICT, Finance, Trade & Industry and Health, fintech companies, digital health service providers, artificial Intelligence firms and experts, ICT Private Sector service providers and telecommunications, utility regulators business influencers and technology innovators among others.
Presidents Paul Kagame and Emmerson Mnangagwa of Rwanda and Zimbabwe respectively are expected to address the summit. President Kagame also chairs the Smart Africa board. Other speakers include Smart Africa Secretariat Director General, Lacina Kone, Rwandan Minister of ICT and Innovation, Paula Ingabire, and Zimbabwe’s Minister of ICT, Postal and Courier Services, Jenfan Muswere among others.
The inaugural Transform Africa Summit held in Kigali, Rwanda from 28 to 31 October 2013 culminated in the adoption of the Smart Africa Manifesto document by seven African heads of state namely Rwanda, Kenya, Uganda, South Sudan, Mali, Gabon, and Burkina Faso in which they committed to providing leadership in accelerating socio-economic development through ICT. The Smart Africa Alliance has since grown to include 36 African countries that represent 1.1 billion people.
Zimbabwe, which joined the Smart Africa Alliance in 2019, bid to host the event last year and a team from Rwanda visited the country last June to assess its suitability.