Benin: Mahuna Akplogan takes charge of the new Ministry of AI.

Mahuna Akplogan officially took office as Minister of Digital Transformation and Innovation, in charge of the National Artificial Intelligence Strategy, on Tuesday, May 26, in Cotonou, during a handover ceremony with the outgoing minister Aurélie Adam Soulé Zoumarou. This portfolio is a creation of the Wadagni government: it did not exist in this form under Patrice Talon, who had merged digital technology into a single department. The new ministry has the explicit mandate to lead the national AI strategy, an unprecedented endeavor in the administrative history of Benin.

Akplogan praised the achievements of his predecessor and expressed his commitment to “continue and amplify the ongoing momentum,” emphasizing a user-centered digital innovation and an artificial intelligence that must “primarily serve Beninese citizens.” Adam Soulé Zoumarou reviewed her nine years at the helm of digital initiatives in Benin: deployment of fiber optics, establishment of data centers, digitization of public services—online access to criminal records, examination result consultations, reduction of administrative delays—and improvement of connectivity in secondary cities like Parakou, Abomey, and Lokossa. She also mentioned the construction of a “digital sovereignty” based on cybersecurity and digital identity among the achievements of the Talon mandate.

Born in Benin to a modest family (his father was a senior executive at the Beninese railway company, his mother a trader), Mahuna Akplogan left the country in 2001 for France. He holds an engineering degree in computer science from the University of Technology of Compiègne (2008) and a PhD in artificial intelligence from the Paul Sabatier University of Toulouse III (2013), focusing on combinatorial optimization, algorithms, and machine learning. He then spent several years in the private sector in France before co-founding iSHEERO in 2019, an association of experts in data science and AI, and then the fintech Finco Digital in 2024. In August 2024, he joined Sèmè City, the innovation and technology entrepreneurship hub in Cotonou, where he contributed to the development of the Beninese digital ecosystem. He is regularly invited as a speaker at conferences on AI and its socio-economic impact in Africa and advocates for integrating AI into education in African languages. He notably participated in a June 2024 webinar hosted by La Nation alongside Henri Verdier, France’s ambassador for digital affairs.

A Ministry Whose Scope Differs from the Talon Model

The reconfiguration of the digital ministerial landscape reflects a twofold logic. On one hand, the creation of a ministry dedicated to digital transformation and AI signals that Wadagni intends to make these issues a full-fledged priority of the mandate, with a holder exclusively focused on these challenges. On the other hand, keeping Aurélie Adam Soulé Zoumarou in the government, but in charge of the Communication and Media portfolio, preserves institutional continuity while freeing up the digital space for a radically different profile.

Among the ongoing projects that the new minister will need to continue is GPT.BJ, a governmental chatbot designed to facilitate citizens’ access to legal texts in the fields of digital technology, taxation, and labor law, developed in partnership with Sèmè City. The national artificial intelligence strategy, which Akplogan is now officially tasked with implementing, had not yet been made public in detail at the time he took office.