He said Africa should treat digital infrastructure, energy, broadband, data systems and computing capacity, as core economic infrastructure rather than a tool built for AI alone. “Just as roads, ports and electricity enabled previous waves of transformation,” he said, digital infrastructure would increasingly determine “investment, productivity and competitiveness.”

Egeh pointed to Somalia's young, digitally savvy population, competitive telecommunications sector and widespread mobile money use as a foundation the country now needs to scale through deeper infrastructure connecting businesses to finance and markets.

He linked Somalia's ambitions to the Horn of Africa Initiative, a regional platform he said is building shared fibre networks, digital infrastructure and interoperable systems among Horn of Africa countries. Combined with the African Continental Free Trade Area, he said, this could expand cross-border payments, trade and data flows. “Regional integration gives us scale,” Egeh said.

He added that partnerships with countries such as Korea would help in “mobilizing investment, technology, knowledge and skills to build bankable infrastructure” across the region, while cautioning that African governments must be deliberate about who owns that infrastructure and where the resulting value is retained.

The conference, marking KOAFEC's 20th anniversary, closed with the adoption of the 2026 KOAFEC Joint Declaration and a two-year action plan covering AI, digital transformation and infrastructure projects across the continent, alongside South Korea's K-AI Package, which pairs infrastructure financing with AI solutions and power supply.