Veritas Becomes Africa’s First Varsity To Sign Humanitas AI Compact

Veritas University, Abuja, has emerged as the first university in Africa to sign the Humanitas Artificial Intelligence (AI) Compact.

The ceremony was held during the university’s 154th Senate session, as the institution’s direct response to the Magnifica Humanitas declared by Pope Leo XIV, which calls on universities worldwide to take responsibility for the ethical deployment and governance of AI.

The Humanitas AI Compact is built on seven guiding principles: Human Dignity, Subsidiarity, the Common Good, the Universal Destination of Goods, Truth, and the Integral Person, alongside seven institutional commitments designed to promote the ethical development and use of AI.

Among the commitments are reviewing educational programmes to prepare students for the AI era while fostering reflection, conscience and discernment; promoting digital literacy that enables learners to understand both the opportunities and limitations of AI; and ensuring that AI-related initiatives prioritise vulnerable groups, including the poor, the sick, displaced persons, women and girls.

Other commitments include directing AI innovation towards justice and peace rather than purely economic efficiency, strengthening partnerships with families, communities and institutions to place the human person at the centre of digital transformation, contributing to public policy and ethical governance of AI, and advancing the principle that the benefits of the digital age should belong to all humanity rather than a privileged few.

The vice chancellor of Veritas University, Rev Fr Professor Hyacinth Ichoku, signed the compact on behalf of the institution.

Other signatories included Professor Emeka Aniagolu for the Institute for African American Studies, Abuja; Elder Solomon Appiah-Wilson for the Commonwealth Forum, London; Dr Sam Amadi for the Centre for AI, Digital Justice and Economic Rights (CADER); and Dr Mehad Nasreldin for the African Institute of Public Health, Addis Ababa.

Addressing the Senate before the signing, Prof Ichoku suspended proceedings to formally execute the agreement, describing the event as Veritas University’s institutional response to the Pope’s appeal for higher education institutions to take a leading role in shaping AI for the benefit of humanity.

“The Humanitas AI Compact exists because of Magnifica Humanitas. In Magnifica Humanitas, the Holy Father, Pope Leo XIV, called on universities and institutions of learning by name to take up their responsibility in the age of artificial intelligence.

“This Compact is our institutional response to that call, beginning from Africa and extending to all institutions entrusted with the formation, protection, education, healing, governance and advancement of the human person,” he said.

According to a press statement issued yesterday by the head, corporate affairs and communication of the University, Ben Agande, the Vice Chancellor explained that the Papal message centres on ensuring that technological advancement remains rooted in human dignity.

“The message is simple: AI must serve humanity, the poor, the sick, the migrant, those displaced by war, women and girls, and all those vulnerable to exclusion, poverty, conflict, sickness, displacement, manipulation and invisibility,” the Vice-Chancellor stated.

Ichoku further stressed that the Catholic Church’s teachings require institutions to move beyond merely admiring papal documents and instead translate them into practical action.

“An encyclical is never only a document to be admired. It is a call to be received, embodied, organised and carried into the world. Educational institutions in Africa must begin to give institutional form to the call of Magnifica Humanitas,” he added.

The Humanitas AI Compact is envisioned as a cross-sector movement advocating that AI must always serve humanity.

It places particular emphasis on protecting vulnerable populations and rejects the notion that AI possesses genuine creativity or moral discernment. The compact also cautions against relying solely on predictive algorithms for critical decisions affecting human lives.