👨🏿‍🚀TechCabal Daily – South Africa fails its AI test

Nigeria’s elections have a retention problem. A new Zikoko Citizen report predicts what participation in the 2027 election might look like, drawing on trends from previous cycles, and explores what could bring about a massive turnaround.

On April 2, South Africa’s Department of Communications and Digital Technologies (DCDT) published a draft version of its AI policy for public comment.

South Africa’s proposal decentralises AI oversight by assigning different agencies to monitor its development. The regulator designated AI technologies as “unacceptable,” “high,” “limited,” and “minimal” risk, marking its risk tolerance and what technologies can be comfortably applied to finance and other critical systems that affect the public.

Failing its own AI test: Yet, in a somewhat dramatic twist, critics of the proposed AI policy have found at least six of the citations in the draft to be fabricated. According to local publication News24, the policy includes referenced articles that were either never published, could not be linked to existing academic journals, or were simply fabricated by AI hallucinations.

It’s a bit of a head-scratcher and an embarrassing situation for a country’s policy against AI risk and ethical use of the technology to be written by AI.

Political critics of Solly Malatsi, the country’s Minister of Communications and Digital Technologies, including Khusela Diko, Chairperson of the Portfolio Committee on Communications, have asked South African regulators to withdraw the policy.

Malatsi responded on Saturday, saying he asked the DCDT Director General to “investigate and take action against anyone found to be responsible for any wrongdoing,” suggesting that regulators are now looking inward to find where the lapses occurred.

In another post on Sunday, Malatsi confirmed the claims to be true and withdrew the draft policy.

“The most plausible explanation is that AI-generated citations were included without proper verification. This should not have happened,” he wrote on X, adding that there will be consequences for those “responsible for drafting and quality assurance.”

Zoomout: South Africa’s cabinet will be scrambling over the next few days to save face in what could potentially be a major public embarrassment resulting from a lack of detail. Whether somebody at the DCDT office used AI or not, the draft policy provided a framework to tackle AI risks as the technology gains more prominence in public systems.

In Nigeria, the Central Bank is urging banks to use AI in money-laundering systems to combat fraud. South Africa’s policy showed that awareness, where most other countries’ frameworks, including Nigeria and Kenya, focused on centralising AI oversight. The intention is good, but the method of delivery may be less than perfect. Right now, South Africa’s cabinet is scrambling, and it is peak theatre.

Fincra connects your business to Africa’s payment rails without building market by market. For collection, payout, FX, and settlement through a single integration. See what this means for your business.

Mastercard is tightening its grip on Africa’s payment rails, and it is doing so from both ends: traditional banking and digital currency.

The payments giant has signed a 10-year agreement with Nedbank, South Africa’s fourth-largest commercial lender by assets, to migrate the bank’s card portfolio onto its network across South Africa, Zimbabwe, Namibia, Eswatini, Lesotho, and Mozambique.

The deal will see Nedbank tap into Mastercard’s fraud detection systems and faster transaction processing as it pushes deeper into digital banking.

This is a long game. Card networks rarely switch, and when they do, it signals a deeper alignment on technology, pricing, and future products. For Mastercard, locking in a major bank across multiple markets strengthens its position in a region where digital payments are growing, especially in e-commerce.

At the same time, it is looking ahead. Mastercard has since announced plans to acquire BVNK, a stablecoin infrastructure company, in a $1.8 billion deal, signalling a future in which card payments and crypto wallets are more intertwined.

Between the lines: Mastercard is not choosing between fiat and crypto. It wants both. By adding stablecoin capabilities to its network, it is positioning itself as the bridge between traditional banking systems and digital currencies.

Why this matters: Payments are becoming a stack rather than a single system. Cards, mobile money, and crypto are increasingly expected to work together, and companies like Mastercard want to sit at the centre of that flow.

For banks like Nedbank, the partnership offers a way to modernise without rebuilding from scratch, plugging into global infrastructure while focusing on customers.

When it comes to gambling and the risk-reward nature of online betting platforms, Kenyan regulators have noticed a trend: the house is always winning, and too many people are paying the price.

The country’s Betting Control and Licencing Board (BCLB), its gaming sector regulator, has set up a dedicated unit to address rising addiction tied to online betting, as concerns grow over how deeply gambling has embedded itself in everyday life. The new unit will focus on consumer protection, awareness, and intervention as cases of problem gambling increase.

This is not happening in isolation. Across Africa, regulators are starting to respond to the surge in online betting. South Africa has moved to tighten oversight around advertising and consumer protection, while Nigeria and Ghana have also faced mounting pressure to rein in aggressive betting practices and protect vulnerable users.

State of play: Kenya’s regulator is trying to move from simply issuing licences to dealing with the consequences. The new unit is expected to monitor betting behaviour, push responsible gambling campaigns, and work with operators to enforce safeguards.

This is also about control. Online betting platforms operate at a scale and speed that regulators have struggled to match, with constant odds updates, instant deposits, and round-the-clock access.

What is really happening? Governments are beginning to treat online betting less like entertainment and more like a public health issue, as addiction concerns rise alongside industry revenues.

Setting up a dedicated regulator for monitoring betting behaviour will place more scrutiny on companies to comply with consumer protection standards. Yet, this could also mean tighter limits on how, when, and how much users can bet, as well as more friction in the once seamless process of placing wagers.

In March 2013, TechCabal published its first article. Thousands of stories later, the work continues, and today, it goes deeper.

TechCabal has always been free. That’s not changing.