South Africa's national artificial intelligence (AI) policy has been postponed until January 2027, a significant delay attributed to the retraction of its initial draft. This retraction was necessitated by the discovery of fictitious references within the document, which are widely suspected to have been generated by AI, marking an embarrassing setback for the nation's technological ambitions.

The Department of Communications and Digital Technologies confirmed the revised timeline to a parliamentary committee. Acting deputy director-general Jeanette Morwane stated that a revised draft is expected to go to cabinet for approval by November 2026, followed by its release for public comment in January 2027. This schedule places the final policy approximately nine months behind its original plan.

The initial draft, released in April 2026 for public comment, aimed to position South Africa as a continental leader in AI innovation while addressing crucial ethical and economic concerns. However, it was swiftly withdrawn after a News24 report exposed numerous citations as fictitious, referring to nonexistent sources and unverifiable documents. AI researchers commonly refer to this phenomenon as “hallucination,” where large language models generate plausible but entirely fabricated information, especially when their knowledge base is insufficient.

Communications Minister Solly Malatsi acknowledged a