‘President caused best benefits of ICT to reach all’

Text of the speech by Secretary to the President Lalith Weeratunga titled ‘Internet for all’ at the inauguration of the INET Colombo 2011 last Monday (23)

Continued from yesterday

The rural community could get internet facility at very low cost through the Nenasala network, which we now plan, with the blessings of the ICTA and the stewardship of the chairman to elevate these as e-Life centres. This is also mentioned in President’s election manifesto of 2010, Mahinda Chinthana, looking towards the future. However, please note that the prime objective of Nenasala is not only providing villages with internet facilities but also a way of changing citizens’ lifestyles with knowledge sharing mechanisms.

“Let me also take you back to 2004 when Sri Lanka had a landmark change in the ICT policy. When Mahinda Rajapaksa at that time the Prime Minister, that is in 2004, was given IT as a subject in his portfolio, he made a fundamental change in the direction we were heading at that time in the ICT programme. He saw the importance of taking ICT to the villages, to the rural communities. We have 77 percent of our population in the rural area. So naturally that was a very wise decision. It was Mahinda Rajapaksa the current President who articulated the fundamentals of the Nenasala programme. Today it has penetrated the rural domain in no uncertain terms. Our aim is to have 1,000 such centres in the whole country. Right now we have something like 600.

“In the first term of his Presidency, once again it was Mahinda Rajapaksa who declared the year 2009 as the Year of English and IT. This drew a great applause from Bill Gates in a video address spanning about four minutes. We needed such a high level of intervention to make both these subjects closer to the rural community and as expected, many stakeholders, lot in the private sector, rallied round the theme for various activities.

great strides in ICT

“Although we have a separate ministry now, for Telecommunication and IT, President’s leadership for the whole ICT sector remains. That I think is a crucial factor in Sri Lanka making great headway in the ICT sector. We have Ranjith Siyambalapitiya, a young minister, who is in charge of giving effect to the government policy in IT. Undoubtedly the President has realised the great potential of this technology in changing lives of rural citizens and therefore keeps a close tab on the progress. I am glad to note that the ministry has recently introduced a five-year ICT action plan for the country to help address the emerging needs.

“Today technology changes so fast. Some months back, I was delighted to buy an iPad and now I feel this is outdated because iPad2 has come. If technology keeps on changing this fast, we have to do something to keep pace with it. Today interestingly even small children are competent in using sophisticated digital devices and are advisers to their parents on how to troubleshoot. I see young children becoming great fans of IT and that is a very good sign.

Power of internet

“The expansion of mobile phones and telecom networks enabled people to access the internet without much difficulty. It is very encouraging to see more and more people using telephones, both fixed and mobile, to transact business and to improve quality of their life. For the last three and a half to four years, not because I am Secretary to the President, but as a normal citizen, I haven’t had to go to any service provider to pay my bills. I have done that from home.

That’s the power of internet. In Sri Lanka of the 20 million people, you would be glad to hear that 18 million people own some kind of telephone which is a great thing that I see as a progress in development.

“Extensive use of telephones has encouraged Telcos to innovate and offer many applications, such as m-learning. Many of these the ICT Agency plans to do in the next few months. Many platforms and applications are being designed by developers to put on the mobile phones.

multi-faceted tool

“With the explosion in the development of ICTs, there is no doubt that the internet has become a multi-faceted tool. Apart from mere communication and entertainment, we can see many opportunities of this wonderful tool - tele medicine, citizens’ services, help during disaster management etc and etc. You name it, and the internet can enter the scene by facilitating all areas in this long list. However, content must be acceptable and accessible to the user.

‘The mode of illustration, the language and style of writing are more important than high tech inputs. Different people will see internet in many different ways: positively, negatively or with a balanced and open-minded attitude - differs from person to person.

Vistas of knowledge

“Well, technologies also emerge fast as I have been telling you and have been in use for some time depending on the users’ choice. Internet’s advantage is that it creates choices for visitors and no one can practically dominate the worldwide web.

“Many of us have learned the intricate nature of the internet by hours and hours of browsing.

“Every time we browsed, it brought us new vistas of knowledge and gave us unforgettable experiences and memories. However, I think that a clear guidance of do’s and don’ts would be useful to prevent a person losing his way in the vast cyberspace, particularly children.

Preservation of cultural values

“Mahinda Rajapaksa in his characteristic style of being practical and down-to-earth has cautioned the authorities in Sri Lanka to make this vast cyberspace safe for our national asset, the children. None of us as parents or right thinking citizens, I am sure all of you are included want our innocent children fall prey to the predators stealthily moving in the cyberspace in search of innocent victims. This is the need of the hour, particularly for Asians who view children differently. They are our best assets and we need to protect them from all evils. Children for us are not just five-year, six-year old but we see children even when they are 18, 19, 20, 21, 22 they are still children where we are concerned. So we need to protect all these people.

“Of course, having said all this, let me also tell you that Internet is not ‘everything’. To me still, books and other print media have their eternal value and one cannot fathom how much of knowledge newspapers can bring into our lives. Although we should be cautious of internet’s use as a learning tool, Sri Lanka should not lose the global competition for managing knowledge for the advancement of the country and that has to be done in different ways.

Sri Lanka, regional knowledge hub

‘Mahinda Chinthana - Vision for the Future’, that is the policy document of the government, outlines the President’s vision to make Sri Lanka a regional knowledge hub by recognising both ancient and modern knowledge systems. The Steering Committee that I chair is now engaged in a process to review how best we should use ICT to disseminate and access vast vistas of knowledge.

We have to learn as well as unlearn many lessons if we are to dominate the region in this area. Other envisaged four hubs - energy, commercial, naval/maritime and aviation hubs - too have to depend heavily on ICT and internet.

The programmers and content developers are invited, therefore, to work on these areas, as by the time the physical infrastructure is ready, soft factors such as ICT systems and manpower too should be well in place, ready for use.

“Let me also take a look at another facet of this whole developmental process. An environmentalist will see internet as a positive contributor for a sustainable environment. Of course it saves people’s movement to various locations due to advanced communication systems such as live video conferencing across continents, thus reducing fuel consumption and carbon emission. Internet and many other ICT solutions save tons of paper.

To be continued