How is Abu Dhabi using AI to replace the long queues and paperwork that once defined government services?

Mohamed Al Askar, Director General of the TAMM Program, recalled childhood experiences of carrying heavy files, making multiple photocopies and waiting in long queues while accompanying his father to government offices. Today, those memories are helping shape Abu Dhabi’s vision of becoming the world’s first AI-native government by 2027, with TAMM moving beyond simply putting services online towards AI agents that can handle tasks on behalf of residents. Al Askar stressed that AI should not merely speed up inefficient processes, saying that “if you bolt AI on top of a bad process, you just make that bad process faster.” The goal is to make government services simpler by shifting the complexity from people to technology.