Professor Yemi Osinbajo, Nigeria’s Vice-President, has inaugurated Africa’s first humanoid codenamed ‘Omeife’ to boost Artificial Intelligence (AI) and technological development in Nigeria and the continent.
Professor Osinbajo was represented at Friday’s inauguration ceremony in Abuja by Professor Isa Pantami, the Minister of Communications and Digital Economy, who in turn was represented by the Kashifu Inuwa, Director-General, National Information Technology Development Agency (NITDA).
The News Agency of Nigeria reports that Omeife was developed by the Uniccon Group.
Omeife is with near-human resemblance, language competency, movement, navigation, and behavioural intelligence using AI and computer vision capabilities.
“We are living in an exciting time of advanced technological advancement, where the science fictions of yesterday are becoming the reality in products and services of today,” he said.
VP Osinbajo said the Federal Government had the responsibility to ensure the success of the project and urged stakeholders to key into it to achieve likewise success as well as develop new ones.
He also allayed fears that technology or artificial intelligence would take over human jobs and render people without employment, arguing that, after all, it was humans that created Omeife and other robots.
Chucks Ekwueme, CEO, Uniccon Group of Companies, said:
Omeife had the ability to speak eight different languages: English, Yoruba, Hausa, Igbo, French, Arabic, Kiswahili, Pidgin, Wazobia and Afrikaans.
He said the six-foot-tall female African humanoid provides language as a service for businesses that need to integrate native African audiences, adding that it is a multipurpose and assistance robot.
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