In June of last year, several dozen dignitaries,
including over twenty
African Ministers of telecommunications, assembled
at the Old
Executive Office Building in Washington, DC for the
launch of the
Leland Initiative (LI) by Vice President Gore and
USAID Administrator,
Bryan Atwood. In a live video hook-up with Ghana,
the Vice-President
discussed the importance of being connected to the
Internet with a group
in Ghana that included government officials, school
children and private
sector representatives. The LI, named after Congressman
Mickey Leland
who died in a plane crash while on a humanitarian
mission in Ethiopia,
is a bold new USAID/State program to install or extend
full Internet
connectivity in up to twenty sub-Saharan African
countries. Such a
program was necessary as Africa lags far behind all
other regions in
telecommunications infrastructure development and
Internet
connectivity.
Recognizing that sound policies are the bedrock of
sustainability, USAID
signed an Interagency Agreement with the State Department
to negotiate
Memoranda of Understanding with the selected countries
which included
policy conditions that would foster private-sector
delivery of Internet
services in their countries. To date, MOUs have been
signed with Benin,
Cote D'Ivoire, Ghana, Guinea, Guinea Bissau, Mali,
Madagascar,
Mozambique and Rwanda. Equipment has been installed
in Mali and
shipped to Madagascar, Mozambique and Rwanda.
As a part of the Leland Initiative, for those countries
where the PTT
will operate the gateway and provide bandwidth to
private-sector Internet
Service Providers (ISPs), a team of experts was sent
to assist them to
construct cost-based tariffs for their service. Assistance
was also
given in the area of constructing a business plan
to operate and grow the service as well as conducting the selection
process for the ISPs. As a result of these activities, templates
have been produced and will be available at the conference along
with lessons learned from the first year of operations .
John L. Mack
Director, Africa Telecommunications Development Policy
U.S. State Department