On 18 November in Cotonou, fifteen countries from West and Central Africa pledged to cut the cost of internet access by half within the next five years.
During the Regional Summit on Digital Transformation, the Digital Affairs Ministers from Benin, Burkina Faso, Ivory Coast, Senegal, Niger, Sierra Leone, Guinea, Cape Verde, Congo, Chad, Nigeria, Liberia, Togo, and Ghana adopted the groundbreaking Cotonou Declaration — a strategic document aimed at removing barriers to digital access in a region still facing significant connectivity challenges.
Presented by Sierra Leone’s Minister of Communications, Salima Monorma Bah, the declaration outlines regional priorities covering connectivity, infrastructure, digital identity, artificial intelligence, and employment. Leaders hailed it as a pivotal step toward creating an integrated African digital market, although the reality on the ground highlights enormous challenges. Currently, only 38-40% of people in West and Central Africa use the internet, leaving 62% offline despite coverage rates reaching up to 80%. The digital divide is widening; countries like Cape Verde, Gabon, and Ghana enjoy usage rates of 60-75%, while Niger and Chad struggle with just 10-15%.
While access exists, millions of households still cannot afford it. West Africa remains the world’s least affordable region for data. On average, fixed broadband costs 21.5% of monthly income — far above the 2% recommended by international standards. Mobile data, though more accessible, consumes 4.6% of income — more than twice the UN’s suggested threshold. In Liberia, a fixed broadband subscription costs over 150% of monthly income, and in the Central African Republic, nearly 27%.
Roger Félix Adom, former Minister of Digital Economy of Côte d’Ivoire, acknowledged that “West and Central Africa pay twice as much per gigabyte as the global average.”
Sangbu Kim, Vice President of the World Bank for Digital Affairs, warned that “without drastic price reductions, it will be impossible to include populations in the digital economy.”
The Cotonou Declaration commits participating nations to modernise networks, strengthen national backbones, harmonise roaming charges, and develop regional internet exchange points to decrease reliance on foreign infrastructure — an often costly and vulnerable dependency. They also aim to boost interconnection between neighbouring countries and establish regional data centres capable of hosting 40% of critical government data by 2030, as currently only 0.2% of global computing capacity is available in West Africa.
“Only shared vision and coordinated investments will enable us to include our populations in the digital economy,” said Benin’s Minister of Digital Affairs, Aurélie Adam Soulé Zoumarou.
The ministers also proposed creating a regional mechanism to finance digital transformation, attracting private capital, multilateral funding, and public investments.
While commitments were made, the real challenge lies ahead: turning words into action.
Moustapha Cissé, CEO of Kera Health and former head of Africa’s first AI research centre, stressed that “the Cotonou Declaration must be the final declaration for the sub-region. Now we must act.”
