Radio Tamazuj
Independent News Crossing Borders
As governments around the world race to position themselves for the age of Artificial Intelligence (AI), South Sudan faces a more fundamental challenge: how can a country embrace advanced technologies when millions of its citizens still lack access to basic education and healthcare?
Artificial Intelligence has enormous potential. It could improve healthcare delivery, strengthen education systems, support agricultural productivity, and increase government efficiency. Across Africa, policymakers are actively exploring how emerging technologies can accelerate development and economic growth.
However, for South Sudan, the conversation about AI must begin with an honest assessment of reality.
According to United Nations and UNICEF estimates, approximately 2.8 million school-age children in South Sudan are out of school, one of the highest out-of-school populations globally. At the same time, the country continues to face one of the world’s highest maternal mortality rates, estimated at more than 1,100 deaths per 100,000 live births, according to the World Health Organization and partner UN agencies.
These are not merely statistics. They represent children whose futures are uncertain, mothers who never return home after childbirth, and communities struggling daily to access services that many societies consider basic.
Across South Sudan, pregnant women still travel long distances to reach health facilities, only to find shortages of trained staff, essential medicines, or emergency obstetric care. Rural communities frequently face limited access to basic healthcare, reflecting deep structural gaps in service delivery. This is the reality in which discussions about AI-driven transformation are taking place.
The issue is not that Artificial Intelligence lacks value. The issue is that AI depends on foundations that South Sudan has yet to fully establish.
Successful adoption of AI requires reliable electricity, internet connectivity, quality data systems, skilled professionals, and institutions capable of managing complex technologies. These are not optional requirements; they are the infrastructure upon which digital transformation is built.
The question, therefore, is not simply how AI will transform South Sudan. The more urgent question is what AI is expected to operate on when schools lack qualified teachers, health facilities lack essential medicines, and public institutions struggle with data collection and management.
Education remains one of the country’s most pressing challenges. Recent UN education assessments indicate that approximately 2.8 million children remain outside the classroom, while many schools that do exist are under-resourced, understaffed, or disrupted by conflict and displacement. This is not only an education crisis; it is a long-term workforce crisis. A country cannot build a competitive digital economy if a large share of its young population is denied access to basic learning opportunities.
Conflict have undoubtedly contributed to these challenges. Years of instability have damaged infrastructure, displaced communities, and weakened public institutions. Yet conflict alone cannot explain the persistence of these problems. Limited reform, weak accountability, and insufficient long-term investment have allowed what began as an emergency to become a structural development crisis.
The consequences are visible throughout the country. Skilled professionals continue to leave in search of better opportunities, including doctors, teachers, engineers, and technology workers. Public services remain fragmented, administrative systems remain weak, and dependence on humanitarian assistance remains high.
A nation that is losing human capital faster than it can rebuild it faces serious obstacles in preparing for an AI-driven future.
Development partners must also reflect on their approach. Too often, international support focuses on short-term projects, pilot initiatives, workshops, and highly visible interventions while underinvesting in long-term system strengthening. There is a risk that AI could repeat this pattern; isolated pilot programs that generate attention but fail to deliver meaningful national transformation.
If South Sudan is serious about preparing for the future, investment priorities must reflect the country’s realities. This means expanding access to quality education, rebuilding healthcare systems, investing in electricity and broadband infrastructure, strengthening national data systems, and developing the skills of the country’s young workforce.
These are not alternatives to technological progress; they are the conditions that make it possible.
Artificial Intelligence may one day play a transformative role in South Sudan’s future. But no technology can substitute for functioning schools, reliable healthcare systems, accountable institutions, and sustained investment in human capital.
A country that struggles to guarantee safe childbirth in rural communities or consistent education for its children cannot meaningfully participate in the AI revolution without first addressing these foundational challenges.
The path to a digital future does not begin with algorithms. It begins with classrooms, clinics, infrastructure, and people.
Until those foundations are strengthened, South Sudan’s greatest challenge is not Artificial Intelligence, it is the scale of unmet human need.
The writer, Dr. John Rubena Wani, is a Doctor of Information Technology graduate, Walden University (USA). He can be reached via email at: john.rubena@gmail.com.
The views expressed in ‘opinion’ articles published by Radio Tamazuj are solely those of the writer. The veracity of any claims made is the responsibility of the author, not Radio Tamazuj.
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