Ambassador Professor Muhammadou M.O. Kah –
Keynote Speaker
His Excellency Ambassador Professor Muhammadou M.O. Kah is the Ambassador Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary of The Republic of the Gambia to the Swiss confederation & Permanent Representative to the United Nations Organizations at Geneva (UNOG), World Trade Organization (WTO), and other International organizations in Switzerland.
Before his appointment in 2020 as Ambassador and Permanent Representative, he was Vice President for Academic Affairs/Provost at the American University of Nigeria, where he also served as Professor of Information Technology & Computing. He also served as the past Chairman of the Africa Group of Ambassadors at Geneva (April 2021- September 2021); Vice President (Africa) for the UN Human Rights Council (2022 and 2023); Current Chairman for UN Commission on Science and Technology Development (CSTD); Vice Chair, CSTD Working Group on Data Governance; Chairman, World Intellectual Property (WIPO ) 9th & 10th Session on High -Level Conversation on IP and Frontier Technologies/AI; a member of the Advisory Board of the UNCTAD Trade and Development Bureau (TDB) (June 2021-July 2023). Ambassador Kah served as one of two Ambassadors who were appointed as Friends of the Chair of the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) General Assembly and serves as one of the Vice Chairs of the General Assembly of the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO).
He has taught in the business schools of Rutgers, Howard, and George Washington universities, as well as served as a Fellow (Non-Resident) at the University of Cambridge’s Judge School of Business. Previously he served as Founding Dean, Chief Technology Officer, and Professor at American University of Nigeria (in partnership with American University in Washington, D.C.) and subsequently as Vice Chancellor/President/Rector of the University of the Gambia, where he was also Professor of Information Technology & Communications.
He also served as a Board of Trustee member of The American University of Nigeria for over a decade and a Founding Dean and Professor of IT and Communications at the School of Engineering and Information Technology and Vice Rector for Technology and Innovation at ADA University, Baku. Currently, he serves on the Board of Trustees of The African University of Science and Technology in Abuja, Nigeria; a Board of Director at the African Agriculture Technology Foundation in Nairobi, Kenya; a member of the Malabo Montpellier Panel and Visiting Professor (Non-resident), University of Johannesburg, South Africa. He also served as Chairman of the Board of Directors of ACT Afrique Group, Dakar, Senegal. He is a founding Board member of The International Digital Health and AI Research Collaborative (IDAIR) – Health AI; Board Member, effective RAI-Advisory firm focused on trusted and responsible AI operations for public and private enterprises and was Founding Board Chairman of Zenith Bank (the Gambia) for a dozen years.
Ambassador Kah holds a B.Sc., M.Sc., and Ph.D. in Information Technology Management from Stevens Institute of Technology. He also holds an M.Sc. in Finance from George Washington University and a Postgraduate Diploma (DipSI) in Strategy & Innovation from Oxford University’s Said Business School. He was awarded an Honorary Doctoral Degree- Doctor of Science (Honoris Causa) by the University of The Gambia a year after he completed his tenure as Vice Chancellor/President of The University of The Gambia.
His latest book is Digital Technology 360 (2025), co-authored with Dr. Yale Li, previously Microsoft’s Principal Security Architect. Ambassador Kah has written many peers reviewed Journal articles on technology, information systems, knowledge management, and on ICT for Development, and he has been honored with numerous awards for public service.
For all of us here at the American University of Nigeria (AUN), we are honored to have His Excellency Ambassador Professor Muhammadou M. O. Kah, as our distinguished keynote speaker for the 17th annual Founder's Day. As the founding dean of AUN’s School of Information Technology & Communications, AUN is home to Ambassador Kah. We are delighted to welcome him, once again, to our beautiful campus.