By Joyce Mukucha
Following the commissioning of the Information and Communication Technologies (ICT’s) Plant that is the brainchild of the Office of the President and Cabinet in Msasa, Harare, Vice President Kembo Mohadi stressed the need to embrace more digital initiatives.
He emphasised that digital initiatives play a pivotal role in the easy access to services, creating digital economy as well as contributing to the development of the nation.
Touring the Data Centre and ICT Assembly Plant in Msasa on Thursday, accompanied by Information Communication Technology, Postal and Courier Services Minister Dr Jenfan Muswere and other Government officials, Honourable Mohadi said digitalisation was of paramount importance in ensuring the smooth flow of various developmental programmes particularly the National Development Strategy 1.
“The National Development Strategy One locates the importance of digitalisation and e-enabled environment as game changer in service delivery.
“It is in that context that I visited the national Data Centre this morning just to familiarise myself with its importance as part of the development of infrastructure supporting an e-enabled governance, digital economy and seamless access to services as well as precursor to the commissioning of the data centre by His Excellency,” said VP Mohadi.
He highlighted that of late, the government is being driven by the motive of forming a concrete intellectual economy that can only become a success when there is a strong digital backbone.
“The current drive of this government is to create a very strong knowledge based economy which is impossible without a digital backbone.”
The Vice President appreciated the data centre indicating its significance in supporting local use of resources and local talents from tertiary learning institutions.
“Concerning this computer assembly plant, the most important issue is that we are using local resources, local talent from our Universities and other institutions of Higher Learning to enable access to Information Communication Technology hardware to as many people as we can. This factory can produce mini tablets for primary schools.”
As the nation is facing difficult times due to the Covid-19 pandemic, VP Mohadi pointed out that ICT provides the base for communication and has positively impacted on the people’s way of life enabling e-meetings and e-conferences to take place in a more organised manner.
“ICT provides the base for communication especially in the era we are living in where Covid-19 has changed our ways of life. We learn through ICT, we get medical counseling through ICT, most of our meetings are now done virtually and the beauty about it is that virtual meetings are focused and on-point. As such we embrace such initiatives.”
During the tour, it was highlighted that Zimbabwe has started assembling at least 50 000 units of local ICTs devices.
The ICT devices include laptops and I-pads annually and 800 units have been already assembled and the treasury has since availed funding for the second batch of 1 500 units earmarked for various Government departments.
The ICT plant is being assembled by a newly registered local firm, Zimbabwe Technology Company, a joint venture of Government, TelOne and Inspur.