Abstract:
Africa's digital transformation is accelerating faster than the cyber resilience needed to protect it. As AU member states roll out digital public infrastructure, expand connectivity, and adopt frontier technologies such as artificial intelligence and, increasingly, quantum computing, the gap between digital ambition and secure, well-resourced cyber capacity is widening. Cyber capacity building (CCB) across the continent remains heavily project-based, donor-dependent, fragmented across initiatives, and vulnerable to funding cycles — undermining the very sustainability it seeks to create.

This session convenes leading continental and international actors — GFCE Africa and the Africa Cyber Expertise (ACE) Consortium, Smart Africa (host of the African Network of Cybersecurity Authorities, ANCA), AUDA-NEPAD, and development partners and donor countries — to move the conversation from delivering capacity building to sustaining it. The dialogue will surface the structural challenges AU member states face, identify concrete opportunities, and examine practical, durable financing models for CCB in an era of AI-driven risk and emerging post-quantum threats. The goal is a set of actionable pathways toward African-owned, sustainably funded cyber capacity building.

Session Objectives
• Provide a shared, evidence-based picture of the sustainability challenge facing CCB in Africa.
• Showcase the complementary CCB efforts of GFCE Africa / the ACE Consortium, Smart Africa / ANCA, AUDA-NEPAD, and development partners, and how they interlock.
• Identify concrete, financeable pathways toward sustainable, African-owned CCB.
• Generate a short set of actionable recommendations to feed into the AfIGF 2026 outcomes/communiqué and into continental cyber processes.

Expected Outcomes & Deliverables:
• A concise set of actionable recommendations on sustainable CCB financing, suitable for inclusion in the AfIGF 2026 communiqué.
• Improved coordination signals among the featured partners, reducing duplication.
• A shared reference framing that member states can use to advocate for domestic CCB budget lines and blended-finance approaches.
• A short post-session summary note for wider dissemination through GFCE Africa, Smart Africa, and AUDA-NEPAD channels.

Relevance to AfIGF 2026:
The session advances the Forum theme of innovation, inclusion, and trust by treating secure, sustainably financed cyber capacity as the foundation of trusted digital transformation. It is action-oriented and multistakeholder by design, connects directly to the AU Digital Transformation Strategy (2020–2030), Agenda 2063, WSIS+20, and the Global Digital Compact, and brings continental delivery bodies into direct dialogue with the member states and donors who fund them.