Tshilidzi Marwala
United Nations University (UNU)

Appointed in 2023 as Rector of the United Nations University (UNU) in Tokyo and United Nations Under-Secretary-General, engineer Tshilidzi Marwala is one of Africa’s most influential voices on artificial intelligence. Before joining the UN, Marwala served as Vice-Chancellor of the University of Johannesburg, where he introduced an ambitious Fourth Industrial Revolution (4IR) strategy that integrated AI into teaching, research and student training.

The author of around twenty books, he explores the relationship between artificial intelligence, governance, development, democracy and the transformation of the Global South. His work applies AI across fields ranging from computer engineering and medicine to finance and the social sciences, always with the goal of improving everyday life. Marwala believes that artificial intelligence can become a powerful tool for achieving the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). His unique position—as Rector of the UNU, the UN’s academic think tank that helps shape policy across the organisation, and as a UN Under-Secretary-General—allows him to bring Africa’s perspective into global debates on AI governance, technological inequality and digital sovereignty.