The Supreme Audit Institutions (SAIs) of Lesotho, Liberia, and Sierra Leone undertook a digitalisation benchmarking visit to Kenya and Tanzania from 20 to 24 April 2026, engaging with peers at the SAI offices in Nairobi and Dodoma. The visit provided a valuable platform for peer-to-peer knowledge sharing, enabling participating SAIs to exchange practical insights on advancing digital transformation. Through direct engagement with Kenya’s experience in leveraging technology to enhance audit performance and institutional efficiency, the visit underscored the critical role of collaboration in accelerating progress.
The initiative reflects the fundamental value of strengthening regional cooperation and creating opportunities for SAIs to learn from one another in addressing common challenges.
The intervention focus included:
- Identify best practices: learn from peer SAIs and leading organisations by identifying proven digitalisation strategies, tools, and implementation approaches.
- Gap analysis: compare the SAI’s current capabilities against benchmarked ISO 27001-certified SAIs to identify gaps, weaknesses, and improvement opportunities.
- Inform strategic decision: look at other SAIs’ digitalisation strategies.
- Strengthen data-driven auditing: understand how other SAIs implement data-led auditing and identify opportunities to enhance audit methodologies through data analytics.
- Policies and governance benchmark: identify key policies, standards, and governance frameworks used by other ISO 27001-certified SAIs to support sustainable digital transformation.
- Learn from other SAIs: facilitate the exchange of knowledge, tools, and experiences with ISO 27001-certified SAIs.
Key insights from the benchmarking included the importance of adopting internationally recognised standards such as ISO 27001, strengthening cybersecurity awareness, and integrating data analytics tools into audit processes. Participants also explored critical areas such as IT governance, network infrastructure modernisation, staff capacity development, and effective change management strategies—all essential components of a successful digital transformation.
The knowledge gained was highly relevant to the three SAIs as they embark on their own digitalisation journey under the AFROSAI-E digitalisation project sponsored by The Global Fund. Lessons from the SAI Kenya and Tanzania experiences provide a practical foundation for modernising ICT infrastructure, strengthening IT governance frameworks, enhancing information security, and embedding data analytics into audit methodologies.
In applying these insights, participants emphasised the need to promote the use of data analytics tools, support digitalisation initiatives, and improve both ICT infrastructure and governance structures. Strengthening information security measures also emerged as a key priority.
However, several gaps were identified that could hinder progress if left unaddressed. These include limited data analytics skills, inadequate IT resources such as servers and data storage, a lack of institutionalised audit methodologies, and weak IT governance frameworks.
To address these challenges, the benchmarking recommended targeted staff capacity building in data analytics, repositioning ICT units as strategic enablers rather than support functions, adopting ISO 27001 as a guiding framework for information security, and strengthening overall IT governance within SAIs.
In conclusion, the benchmarking provided valuable, practical insights into digital transformation in the public audit space. SAIs Kenya and Tanzania demonstrated strong leadership and expertise, offering a compelling model for other institutions. Continued benchmarking with leading SAIs will play a critical role in supporting effective and sustainable digitalisation initiatives across the region.
Contributors: Thabang Mohlokaqala, SAI Lesotho and Fredrick Bobo, AFROSAI-E
Click here for the in-depth reflections on the SAI Tanzania benchmark visit.
