… ‘We were blown away by the response’, says PRO Dario McKlmon
HUNDREDS of Lindeners thronged the Egbert Benjamin Conference Centre in Mackenzie, Linden on Friday when the One Laptop Per Family (OLPF) road show kicked off with a team headed by OLPF Public Relations Officer, Dario McKlmon.
Speaking with the Sunday Chronicle after the successful staging which was interspersed with skits and interactive sessions with the OLPF team, which explained the processes involved, McKlmon said “To be honest, we were blown away by the response that we got here in Linden for the first road show.
“We were scheduled to start this programme at 17:30hrs. When we arrived in Linden at 15:00hrs, there were dozens of people here waiting to be served. We could not even set up. We had to commence service immediately.
“By the time the starting time came around, we had already served 300 people. And then we had all the hundreds of people who came for the official road show.”
When he reflected on this surprise start regarding the residents turning out in their numbers, he added, “So we were very enthused, we were very pleased about what we saw here today.”
He explained, “The OLPF project itself has been staffed with competent and capable people in the field of Information Communication Technology (ICT) and other fields, who are able to drive this process. Those persons are serving in a central office, and other persons are serving in all regions as community liaison officers. We are establishing verification teams that will go out and verify all the data that is entered on the forms.”
He said that, generally, the OLPF team is capable of driving this programme towards a successful implementation end.
Asked about how the team will be dealing with verification, McKlmon informed “The verification team will be checking with your employment agencies, investigating truly how you derive your income, and that you meet the criteria.”
He further stated: “There is some amount of flexibility in this process, where the priority group we say is low income earners who earn $50,000 or less; but if you show your income is $52,000 or $55,000, you can still be considered.”
Additionally, training programmes will be held at over 200 hubs across Guyana to ensure the successful realisation of the initiative.
Looking back at the initiative, McKlmon observed: “One of the key developmental paths is the ICT agenda which was crafted in 2006 through a nationwide process, when all of Guyana decided that we want to move Guyana forward into the information technological age at a very rapid pace, and all of Guyana needs to be on board.”
He pointed out, “It is within that context that President Bharrat Jagdeo conceptualised the One Laptop Per Family.
“It is aimed at empowering Guyanese through the expansion of the country’s ICT base, and in 2011 and 2012, we will see 90,000 families receiving laptops from the government.”
The first distribution process will target single parents, disabled persons and individuals earning 50,000 per month or less, while the next phase is for persons earning $100,000 or less a month.
According to the PRO, “at the end of May 31, we will close the application process for Phase One, which is 2011; and all of June we will execute verification of your data; and I presume that by July we will enter the phase where we can begin distribution of the laptops.”