Côte d’Ivoire is driving one of Africa’s most ambitious digital transformations, aiming for a fully paperless government by 2030.
Karen Diallo, Director of Digital Transformation in Côte d’Ivoire’s Ministry of Digital Economy, is at the centre of one of West Africa’s most ambitious public sector modernisation programs, PARAE (Programme d’Appui à la Réforme de l’Administration de l’Etat) project. As the country wraps up its current digital strategy and drafts a new roadmap for 2026–2030, Diallo’s team is pushing to unify services, invest in AI, support startups, and—eventually—make paper government processes obsolete.
TechCabal spoke to Diallo on the sidelines of the Cyber Africa Forum. In this conversation, she discusses Côte d’Ivoire’s priorities around artificial intelligence, the role of local startups in public procurement, and why the country is betting big on connectivity and digital identity infrastructure.
Can you walk us through some of the most transformative pillars of Côte d’Ivoire’s digital strategy?
We’re currently closing out the 2021–2025 digital strategy, so we’re already drafting the next one for 2026–2030. But for this phase, three projects stand out. First is interoperability: we’re building a system that gives citizens unified access to all public services from a single platform. Second is the national digital ID. And third, we’ve launched an access gateway that lets people request any public document or information in one place.
We’re also investing heavily in AI and digital governance. We released strategies for both earlier this year and are now calling for investment to implement them. And of course, rural connectivity is a major focus, ensuring people outside cities can access digital services.
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