PRESIDENT Robert Mugabe officially opened the Zimpost Murombedzi Community Information Centre in Zvimba recently before African and European delegates who were coming from the African Telecommunications Union Summit (ATU).
By TechnoMag
While addressing the delegates and members of the public who had gathered to witness the official unveiling, Mugabe spoke passionately on how he understood the need to support information communication technologies and the growth of technology in Zimbabwe.
Mugabe said that Murombedzi centre was only a leading site towards fulfilling the vision, and four more sites were now ready for official unveiling around the nation as government seeks to provide technological solutions to their communities.
He said that such a decision came from a Geneva resolution to support the rural communities of their respective countries.
“This is in line with the World Summit on the Information Society Geneva Declaration of 2003, where with other Heads of State and Government we laid the foundation of the information and knowledge society,” he said.
“The WSIS declaration and subsequent activities seek to specifically provide ICT access to rural communities.”
Mugabe also said that this programme would see all the nation’s 52 districts having their own technology centre or community information centre.
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“We have been moving around various rural schools, and have donated a minimum of 10 computers per every school and we are still inspired by the activity to bring the technology to all corners of the nation”, he added.
These community information centres are meant to be one stop ICT shops, to provide services for the community including communication services online, printing, laminating, scanning services and many more.
“The overall aim in the establishment of these Community Information Centres is to achieve equity of access to information and thereby bridge the technological digital divide between rural and urban communities,” Mugabe said.
He said they also served as disaster recovery centres in times when a nation is under health pandemics like cholera, malaria or even natural emergencies too.
In his remark, Mugabe spoke about the need to guard against cyber threats and crimes, and advocated for youths and scholars to be protected against harmful websites or online content which may be perpetrated by various online sources.
Zimpost and the Ministry of ICT partnered to see the vision of the Murombedzi community information centre become a reality with a fully-fledged technological centre operational in the rural areas.
A total 27 desktop computers were installed at the centre where they are expected to serve members of the community with various services and keep them in the technological loop.
NetOne, a State-owned mobile operator, also introduced their recently launched Chatter Box, a fixed phone service to the community. The Ministry of Information Communication Technology, Postal and Courier Services presented 10 desktop computers to the President, while TelOne managing director Chipo Mtasa handed over the latest Apple iMac to Mugabe.
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