THE E-Governance Unit has been charged with providing the Administration with a complete report on all matters relating to the body and its activities. This step was made known to members of the media attending yesterday’s post-Cabinet press briefing hosted by Minister of State, Mr. Joseph Harmon, at the Ministry of the Presidency, Shiv

Chanderpaul Drive.
The Minister explained that the advice to “cut its loss” was given by Head of the Unit, Alexei Ramotar, to the previous Administration, and has nothing to do with what the current Government is doing.
At the time, and according to Ramotar, based on information from sources in Venezuela, the repairs to the controversial fibre optic cable project was in the vicinity of US$20M, and therefore was not feasible. Ramotar recently told Minister Harmon during a visit to the Unit’s Duke and Barrack Street office that the cable had suffered about 40 percent damage.
This was some four years after an agreement was signed between Guyana and Brazil for the stringing of a fibre optic cable.
However, Mr. Harmon has now requested “information from the unit on the E-Government project and all of its subsidiary activities” so that the present Government can review it.
Mr. Harmon added that Mr. Alexie Ramotar “is still employed by the State, and so must produce all documents on the state of connectivity, on other projects – towers, internet, etc.” He said further that Ramotar advised him that the “internet connectivity is at a very advanced stage.”
The Minister explained that the overall purpose of E-Governance in Guyana is that the Government wants to better position itself to equip the Guyana Police Force (GPF) to fight crime and help schools and ministries to perform their duties effectively.
He stated that Government is not about “competing with service providers like Guyana Telephone and Telegraph (GT&T) and Digicel, but to connect communities via hubs with internet.”
ONE LAPTOP PER FAMILY PROJECT
Minister Harmon also told reporters that Mr. Floyd Levi is the Administration’s Advisor on E-Governance, and he was part of the team which visited the E-Governance Unit recently. Levi will also be on the team that will be reviewing the One Laptop Per Family (OLPF) project.
Media operatives were also told at yesterday’s briefing that the Ministry of Education under the Granger Administration will be distributing approximately 168 laptops and some amount of tablets to students who had excelled at the recently-concluded National Grade Six Assessment (NGSA).
The plan to distribute these laptops and tablets was disclosed by Minister of Education, Dr. Rupert Roopnaraine during the Cabinet briefing.
Dr. Roopnaraine believes that this distribution will be a “suitable” reward to the students for their excellence in the examination. The delivery of these devices will not be limited to only one area but will be delivered to the top students all across Guyana.