Craig Wright at Africa Tech Festival: Bitcoin SV will transform Africa

“My name is Craig Wright and I’m here to talk to you about what Bitcoin is really about.”

Dr. Craig Wright took the virtual stage at the recent Africa Tech Festival to talk about how Bitcoin SV can transform the African continent. His presentation touched on why stability and security are critical for Bitcoin, how very low fees and instant transactions can bring financial inclusion in Africa and why Bitcoin is more than just a digital currency.

In a session titled “Bitcoin SV: The Blockchain to Empower Global Trade & Honesty,” Dr. Wright debunked the false notion that Bitcoin is just an asset to make some quick bucks.

“Bitcoin is an electronic cash system that allows you to transfer money quickly and easily, and to hold it without any of the infrastructure that’s necessary to do this,” he said.

Satoshi began by stressing the importance of Bitcoin having a stable protocol. Quoting the Bitcoin whitepaper, he told the audience that, “The nature of Bitcoin is such that once version 0.1 was released, the core design was set in stone for the rest of its lifetime.”

“Bitcoin SV is my original version and it’s the only Bitcoin,” Dr. Wright said.

Bitcoin BSV is the only blockchain that can scale massively. In its current state, it can already process 600 transactions per second, “which is still slow,” he noted. In time, BSV will scale to a million transactions per second, and eventually, eliminate the scaling limit.

Scalability is important, especially for Africa, according to the nChain chief scientist. The continent still has a financial system that marginalizes the majority, denying them basic financial services. This lack of financial services forces most people to rely on cash, which is unsafe. Those that can access banking services aren’t spared either, with volatile currencies and high inflation rates affecting African countries more than any other region.

Bitcoin SV is already becoming a force in Africa, Dr. Wright pointed out. He cited Johannesburg-based Centbee as one of the leaders in BSV in Africa. Centbee has continued to onboard thousands of users, primarily in Africa, allowing them to easily buy and spend Bitcoin SV on a variety of services and products. Incidentally, Centbee co-founder and CEO Lorien Gamaroff was also one of the speakers at the event.

While Bitcoin SV is undoubtedly the best P2P electronic cash globally, it’s more than just a digital currency, Dr. Wright told the virtual audience.

“Bitcoin is more than just a digital currency. It allows you to build an immutable evidence chain. It enables you to put value on all the exchanges that you do. Bitcoin enables you to integrate finance into the systems you’re creating.”

Bitcoin can help Africa fight yet another ill that has plagued it for decades—corruption. The Bitcoin blockchain’s immutable and transparent nature ensures that no corrupt dealings can take place.

Africa has continued to explore the use of blockchain to tackle corruption. In Nigeria, HouseAfrica has pioneered land registration on the blockchain, helping the government stamp out land grabbing by public officials. As CoinGeek reported, the U.N has also called on Kenya to integrate blockchain to fight the rampant corruption in the East African nation.