If the 20th century belonged to railways and highways, the 21st belongs to fibre and frequencies — and East Africa, once again, is building a piece of it.

The recent September report by the International Telecommunication Union (ITU) on Broadband Development in Africa 2025 shows that East Africa is now home to some of the continent’s fastest-growing broadband networks and the steepest drops in internet costs.

Kenya, Tanzania, and Uganda lead the charge, with average connection speeds doubling since 2020 and data prices falling by more than half.

If the Kenya–Uganda Railway was the iron thread that stitched the region into global trade, today’s Digital Express is light flowing through cables instead of steam through pistons.

The coast of Kenya has become a new digital port, where global subsea cables dock, much like 21st-century dhows. More than 10 major undersea cables now land at Mombasa, among them the SEACOM, EASSy, PEACE, TEAMS, and 2Africa systems. Together, they link the region to Europe, Asia, and the Gulf, carrying terabits of information each second.

Uganda’s youthful online energy, despite periodic political restrictions, continues to defy limits — from fintechs scaling up in the region to digital art collectives gaining global attention. Tanzania’s hinterland, meanwhile, is the frontier where fibre meets forgotten communities.

The ITU report states that broadband penetration in East Africa averages 40 per cent, but what’s truly notable is how access has extended beyond the big cities.

In Tanzania, for example, over 70 percent of new subscribers since 2022 are from secondary towns and rural areas. That, for a region long shaped by capital-city dominance, is close to revolutionary.

The report deserves applause for its honesty. It captures not only the progress but also the peculiar contradictions that make Africa the world’s most dynamic yet uneven digital frontier.

More than 710 million Africans now have access to mobile broadband. Still, they aren’t connected, highlighting the point that broadband is never just about connection — it’s also about control and financial benefits.

Governments continue to walk a fine line between enabling innovation and policing cyberspace. The ITU warns that over-regulation, excessive taxation, and inadequate coordination between countries could hinder progress.

Elsewhere, however, the most significant barrier is simpler and more human. As a recent Semafor Africa report notes, the problem is devices. A basic internet-enabled phone still costs about 87 per cent of a poor household’s monthly income, and taxes make them even pricier.

However, history, as always, offers a useful parallel.

When the first tracks of the Kenya–Uganda Railway were laid at the turn of the 20th century, the project was derided in London as the Lunatic Express.

Critics scoffed at its cost, doubting that any good could come from laying steel across what they called «a land of lions and fever.» However, the railway did more than transport goods; it also moved people and possibilities.

It brought thousands of Indian workers, engineers, and traders. Many stayed, giving birth to one of East Africa’s most enterprising communities. Over time, they became the backbone of the region’s commerce, industry, and civic modernity — leaving an imprint still visible in its architecture, cuisine, and philanthropy.

Who, one wonders, will be the modern-day equivalents the Digital Express draws to its tracks? Already, we see hints. Nigerian fintech founders are opening offices in Nairobi, with Rwandan AI labs collaborating with experts from Estonia and Singapore. Kenyan developers writing code for Californian and Berlin start-ups while sipping tea in Kiambu or Kilifi.

If the Lunatic Express carried indentured labourers and adventurers from the Indian subcontinent, the Digital Express carries a new migrant class — borderless coders, analysts, and creatives whose passports are laptops. They may not remake the region’s streets as the earlier settlers did, but they are remaking its economy, one line of code at a time.

Of course, every great project has its monsters. The old railway had the man-eating lions of Tsavo; this one has its own «digital lions» — cybercriminals, predatory data miners, and monopolies feeding on weak regulation.

The ITU report warns that as much as 30 per cent of Africa’s internet traffic could be exposed to data vulnerabilities due to poor protection laws. However, unlike the lions of Tsavo, which mauled a few dozen men, these could devour entire economies if left unchecked.

Still, we have to be mindful that infrastructure alone never built a nation; imagination did. The Kenya–Uganda Railway transformed East Africa not because it ran, but because people learned to run with it — to trade, travel, and dream differently. The Digital Express demands the same leap of imagination.

If policymakers can keep costs falling, rural coverage expanding, and regional frameworks harmonised, East Africa could emerge as the continent’s digital heart.

But if the region retreats into comfort and control — taxing innovation, throttling dissent, and hoarding spectrum — others will race ahead.

Still, we could use some optimism. Maybe — just maybe — this time, unlike with the Lunatic Express, East Africa will keep the Digital Express running into the future.

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