The Ethics and Governance Group at the NLP-CoP is hosting a conversation about AI autonomy, regionalization and ethics on May 25, 2026, at 10am ET, 4pm Harare, 10pm Singapore. We will be joined by Chenai Chair (from Masakhane African Languages Hub), William Tjhi (from SEA-LION), and Wayan Vota (ICTworks).

Get to know our speakers: 

• Chenai Chair is the Director of the Masakhane African Languages Hub, where she leads strategy and initiatives aimed at positioning the Hub as a global leader in African language AI. In 2020, she founded My Data Rights (Africa), an online platform that maps AI, privacy, and data protection issues from an African feminist perspective. Her work applies feminist principles to examine how digital technologies are designed, deployed, and experienced, ensuring they reflect contextual realities and global connections. Chair has contributed extensively to areas including women and gender diverse peoples rights online, digital identity, online gender-based violence, and data and AI governance, bringing a strong focus on equity, social justice, and inclusive digital transformation.
  
• William Tjhi is Deputy Director (AI Products) at AI Singapore and SEA-LION, where he is working to create LLMs that cater to under-represented population groups and low-resource languages in Southeast Asia. William Tjhi has been practising machine learning and data science in Singapore for more than a decade. He got his PhD from Nanyang Technological University in 2008 and his current interests include Natural Language Processing, the regional practice of AI and the fascinating intersection between the two. 
  
• Wayan Vota is an award-winning strategist with three decades of success proving that social impact organizations can scale purpose and profits. He drives strategy, increases impact, and leads firms through the complex changes brought by artificial intelligence solutions.