- Critics argue Smart Africa’s digital agenda risks entrenching dependence on political and external actors rather than building African technical autonomy.
- CAIGA’s emergence has raised fears that Africa’s internet governance is becoming more vulnerable, not more resilient.
From digital ambition to structural reliance
Africa’s digital transformation is often framed as a story of opportunity: new infrastructure, new markets and new governance frameworks. Smart Africa has positioned itself as a central driver of this vision, promoting continent-wide coordination across policy, regulation and digital infrastructure. Yet critics increasingly warn that this approach may be reinforcing structural dependency rather than reducing it.
The concern is not digital cooperation itself, but the model through which it is being pursued. Initiatives like the Continental Africa Internet Governance Architecture (CAIGA) embed political authority and external institutional support at the core of Africa’s digital future, while weakening the role of independent technical institutions. Instead of empowering African operators and communities, this risks making governance contingent on continental politics and international endorsement.
Also Read: Why CAIGA’s expansion is drawing international criticism
Also Read: CAIGA’s failure to address data exploitation in Africa
Central coordination without technical sovereignty
True digital resilience depends on local capacity: engineers, network operators, registries and civil society groups with authority over infrastructure decisions. CAIGA’s design, however, concentrates influence at a political level, with limited guarantees that technical communities retain meaningful control.
This creates a paradox. While Smart Africa speaks the language of sovereignty, CAIGA may actually reduce it by shifting decision-making away from those who run the networks and towards structures that rely on diplomatic consensus and external legitimacy. In practice, this could leave Africa’s internet more exposed to geopolitical pressure, policy volatility and regulatory misalignment.
Rather than strengthening AFRINIC or rebuilding trust in existing institutions, CAIGA risks sidelining them altogether, creating a governance system that looks coherent on paper but lacks operational depth.
Also Read: Smart Africa and CAIGA fail to earn public trust
Also Read: Who should govern Africa’s internet — AFRINIC or CAIGA?
ICANN’s involvement amplifies dependency concerns
ICANN’s financial and institutional support for Smart Africa’s governance blueprint has further sharpened criticism. An organisation that positions itself as a neutral steward of global internet coordination is now entangled in a political framework that many see as increasing Africa’s reliance on external actors. Analysts at the Internet Governance Project warn this creates a dangerous precedent for how governance standards are applied in different regions
At a moment when Africa needs to reduce dependency and rebuild institutional strength, critics argue Smart Africa’s approach risks doing the opposite — substituting technical autonomy with political coordination, and resilience with exposure.
