African media must follow the money and treat AI as a story about power, not tech

Daily Maverick

a day ago

Scott Timcke is a senior research associate with Research ICT Africa. He is affiliated with the University of Johannesburg's Centre for Social Change and the Center for Information, Technology, and Public Life, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.
A gap has emerged in global discussions about AI governance during South Africa's G20 presidency. This is the role of independent media as democracy's watchdog in an age of concentrated digital power.
The Media20 (M20) initiative – an independent civil society initiative that mirrors official G20 engagement groups for business, think tanks and civil society, among others – has identified this gap through a recent set of policy briefs, in particular, one on AI, Africa and the G20.
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The findings point to a conundrum. Just as AI systems increasingly shape economic, social and political outcomes across Africa, the media's capacity to scrutinise these developments is being undermined by the very forces they should be monitoring.
The triple challenge facing African media
Three interconnected challenges demand urgent G20 attention. First, AI development remains concentrated among a handful of global technology companies, creating concentrations of transnational power that national regulatory mechanisms struggle to govern effectively.
When decisions made in Silicon Valley boardrooms can determine whether African farmers receive crop recommendations or students access educational content, the stakes for democratic oversight come into relief.
Second, Africa occupies a structurally disadvantaged position in the global AI economy. While African workers earn just $1-$3 per hour, labelling images that enable billion-dollar AI applications like autonomous vehicles, they remain locked out of the more profitable layers of the AI technology stack.
This digital extraction mirrors historical patterns of resource exploitation where raw materials flow outward while value-added benefits remain elsewhere.
Third, and perhaps most critically, journalism covering AI governance suffers from significant knowledge gaps. Too many reporters treat AI developments as 'technology stories', focusing on capabilities and breakthrough narratives, rather than examining the deeper 'power and policy stories' that reveal governance implications and labour impacts.
This framing obscures the real questions: Who controls these systems? How are decisions made? What is the impact on ordinary Africans?
Democracy under pressure
This oversight becomes particularly concerning given Africa's deteriorating information ecosystem. Since 2022, foreign-sponsored disinformation campaigns have targeted at least 39 African countries, exploiting structural vulnerabilities including limited media literacy and declining press freedom.
Meanwhile, governments increasingly distort 'fake news' or 'misinformation' laws to suppress dissent, while internet shutdowns undermine freedom of expression and access to information.
The surge in information manipulation coincides with AI systems increasingly shaping critical sectors such as agriculture, health, education and governance itself.
When algorithmic decision-making affects everything from loan approvals to university admissions, independent oversight becomes more crucial than ever. Yet the technical complexity of AI systems often shields corporate practices from public scrutiny, while the global nature of AI companies complicates jurisdictional oversight.
The M20's democratic vision
The M20 initiative seeks to interact with official G20 engagement groups and advocate for media recognition as a core pillar of sustainable financial development, human rights and global cooperation. This approach recognises that effective AI governance cannot emerge from purely technocratic solutions; it requires robust democratic accountability mechanisms.
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The initiative's recommendations for G20 consideration include establishing AI governance transparency standards that mandate algorithmic impact assessments for government AI deployments, supporting independent AI oversight mechanisms through funding streams for media organisations to develop AI governance expertise, and promoting African AI tools that serve local languages and contexts rather than marginalising them.
Most importantly, the M20 calls for strengthening media freedom through concrete benchmarks for press freedom and information integrity, including sanctions for governments that weaponise disinformation legislation against journalists.
Reframing the story
For African media organisations, the challenge lies in developing the technical literacy needed to cover AI governance effectively, while maintaining editorial independence from potentially unsustainable and biased AI services. If done correctly, they can reframe AI coverage to focus on power dynamics rather than 'technological wizardry'.
This means following the money and data in AI systems, particularly examining how African data contributes to AI development and whether economic benefits flow back to African communities.
It means developing systematic approaches to covering government use of AI in service delivery and security agencies, with attention to transparency and citizen impact.
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Most crucially, it means challenging corporate narratives about AI benefits with independent verification, particularly examining outsized claims about the ability of AI solutions to achieve development goals.
A continental imperative
The stakes extend beyond journalism itself. AI systems are reshaping Africa's relationship with the global economy, determining whether the continent remains locked into extractive relationships or develops genuine technological sovereignty.
The African Union's Continental Artificial Intelligence Strategy, endorsed last year, recognises this imperative. But implementation requires the kind of sustained, critical oversight that only independent media can provide.
As recent reports indicate a decline in press freedom across major democracies, with significant economic pressures on news organisations, the M20's mission becomes even more acute.
Effective AI governance requires collaborative networks that share resources and expertise across borders, recognising that the forces shaping Africa's digital future operate on a global scale. For African media, this means that embracing their role as democracy's watchdog becomes more vital in an era of concentrated digital power.
The question is whether Africa's journalists are ready to tell the real story of AI; not as a tale of technological progress, but as a fundamental question of power, democracy and self-determination. DM