For Ghana to suggest that they will turn off the Internet, in addition to other countries that have done it like Uganda, Zimbabwe, DRC, Burundi, Chad and others, that's worrying.
While I am a huge proponent of us as Africans telling our own stories and countering the negative stereotypes out there since no one else will, I am also cognizant of the power that the mainstream Western media still has on shaping perceptions of the continent.
Press and Internet freedom correlate against economic and social success, GDP, innovation, number of patents filed, and educational attainment. The more freedom there is, the more information, the more choice, and ultimately, more power for each individual.
As a young African, the sense of opportunity that fills my head on a daily basis is, I suspect, reminiscent of how young Africans felt at the cusp of independence.
The increasing diversification of media ecosystems after decades of state control, along with new digital tools that allow for greater citizen engagement, have led to a dramatic reshaping of the dynamics between citizens, media, and government.
I spent a lot of my early blogging career sort of highlighting all the ills of the government in Kenya and all the corruption and problems.
The city of Johannesburg built an app because they are getting so many complaints on Facebook and Twitter about potholes. The app allows you to report a pot hole and take a picture of it. Then, you can actually track the progress in terms of the repair, when it happened.
Technology is the perfect refuge for African capability stifled elsewhere by badly run governments and years of misplaced foreign aid. Ubiquitous connectivity in a world without legacy infrastructure, together with the potential to learn coding or anything else online, has allowed technology entrepreneurship to flourish.
All of us salute the ITU's excellent work in the telecommunications space. It has set standards which encourage investment in infrastructure and ensure that a call made from Europe or America connects smoothly in Kenya or anywhere in the world.
