Author: Smart Megwai

₦208,000 down. 15% commission. Daily costs slashed in half. If those numbers don’t jump out at you, they should. Bolt’s recent rollout of ₦3.2 million electric tricycles in Lagos isn’t just another pilot project to test the EV waters — it’s a real-time attempt to crack one of Africa’s hardest…

At first glance, it looks like a loyalty card. A simple digital ID bearing a name, a flag, a QR code. But what Peter Obi and his team have just launched is more than political branding. It’s a bold, data-driven experiment in organising a movement through technology — and it…

It’s official — WAEC and NECO are going digital. According to Nigeria’s Minister of Education, Dr. Tunji Alausa, Computer-Based Testing (CBT) will become the new normal for the country’s major secondary school exams starting in 2026. Objective papers will begin CBT rollout as early as November 2025, with full essay…

Once upon a time, you could go to work, clock out, and leave your private life… well, private. Today, that line is disappearing — and technology is a big part of the problem. The shocking scandal at Access Bank, where a staff member allegedly recorded over 400 secret videos of…

When MTN Group — Africa’s biggest mobile operator — announced it had suffered a cybersecurity breach last week, a lot of people shrugged it off. No money stolen. Core networks intact. “At least it’s not that bad,” right? Wrong. Because once you realise that millions of personal records could be…

When news broke this week that Oladapo Olalekan Fadugba, a Nigerian-born U.S. citizen, had been indicted in Florida for allegedly diverting over $690,000 in federal funds through wire fraud, the headlines followed a familiar formula: Nigerian. Fraud. Identity theft. To some readers, it’s just another chapter in the so-called “Nigerian…

Every year, malaria kills over 600,000 people globally—with Africa accounting for 96% of those deaths. On the surface, fighting this disease looks like a humanitarian effort. But dig deeper, and a compelling truth emerges: eradicating malaria is not just a moral obligation—it’s a scalable industry. This year, on World Malaria…

On May 1, 2025—International Workers’ Day—drivers for Bolt, Uber, and other e-hailing platforms in Lagos will stage a 24-hour strike. Their message is clear: “We will not be ignored.” And for anyone watching the gig economy in Africa, this isn’t just a protest—it’s a reckoning. The planned strike, organised by…

When the West African Examinations Council (WAEC) recently announced it had banned 574 secondary schools from conducting the 2025 WASSCE due to exam malpractice, the news sent shockwaves through Nigeria’s education sector. But beyond public outrage lies a deeper question: Can technology finally solve WAEC’s cheating crisis? The scale of…

The 2025 UTME kicked off today, with over 2 million candidates sitting for Nigeria’s biggest university entrance exam. But alongside the usual anxiety and expectations came a now-familiar shadow: cheating scandals. This year, the Joint Admissions and Matriculation Board (JAMB) revealed it had deliberately created a fake “expo” website—and 180…

When WhatsApp quietly rolled out its new in-app translation feature to some Android beta users in 2025, most people saw it as a win for casual conversations and travel plans. But there’s another group that should be paying very close attention: small businesses. WhatsApp Business is already a lifeline for…

Africa has traditionally been viewed as a consumer of used vehicles from Asia, Europe, and America to fulfil its mobility needs. However, this perspective is shifting. Across the continent, both governments and manufacturers are driving a quiet revolution: local auto assembly. In countries such as Nigeria, Ghana, Kenya, Rwanda, and…

Electric vehicles are gaining momentum across Africa, but the biggest roadblock isn’t interest—it’s infrastructure. While developed markets rely on dense networks of charging stations and home chargers, many African cities and towns still struggle with unreliable power supply, limited grid coverage, and high electricity costs. That’s why one homegrown solution…

When people think of classic cars, images of a 1967 Mustang or a 1959 Cadillac might come to mind. But across Africa, an entirely different lineage of beloved vehicles has shaped everyday life—and many of them are disappearing without a trace. In Nigeria, the Peugeot 504 wasn’t just a car;…

When we talk about electric vehicles (EVs), the usual suspects come to mind: Tesla in the U.S., BYD in China, or Volkswagen in Germany. But a quiet EV revolution is brewing in a less-expected corner of the world—Africa. More specifically, Nigeria. Meet NEV Electric, a Nigerian-based EV startup that’s raised…

Every minute, over 2 million mobile money transactions occur across Africa. That’s not hyperbole. It’s the new normal in a continent that’s home to 1.1 billion registered mobile money accounts and processed $1.1 trillion in transactions in 2024 alone, according to GSMA’s State of the Industry Report on Mobile Money…

In an era marked by dwindling funding and cautious investors, The Africa Report’s latest ranking of the 20 Future Champions of Tech in Africa offers a fresh and necessary lens into the continent’s shifting innovation landscape. Led by journalist and editor Julien Wagner, the report seeks not just to spotlight…

For decades, building hardware in Nigeria has been a cautionary tale. Even the most promising ideas often didn’t survive past ideation, from the cost of components to a lack of specialised talent and infrastructure. Just ask the team behind Humane — no, not the AI Pin startup that raised $230…

What if AI helped you become a better writer instead of just writing for you? That’s the vision behind Thesify, an AI-powered tool for students, researchers, and knowledge workers. I spoke with co-founder Marc-Oliver Gewaltig about Thesify’s growing user base in Nigeria, the importance of writing in the AI era,…

You and I know that a simple phone call is no longer as innocent as it once was. With the rise of spam calls, fraud, and identity scams, it has become essential to know who is calling before answering. This is why caller identification services have become so popular, and…