In Africa, technology is the basic need of every other basic need. It is the key to solving the continent's most pressing social and economic issues, and it will provide the conduit for future infrastructural development that will unlock the immense economic potential that lies within the ambit of Africa's bountiful natural resources.
Clearly, there is a need for a technological revolution in Africa, one that will rapidly narrow and eventually eliminate the large socio-economic gap that currently exists between the developed world and most countries an the continent.
The establishment of an effective continental communications infrastructure is vital in this regard. At a meeting of African Communications Ministers in Cape Town in February last year, a process called the African Connection was set in motion to achieve just that
The African Connection Rally is part of this process. It is a clarion call to the governments and technological corporate giants of the developed world to join with their African counterparts, in creating an information superhighway that will extend the intellectual and social horizons of all Africans' and bring the continent truly into tire information age.
The Rally will be one with a difference. Two 4X4 vehicles will start out from Tunisia in the north on 28th March and travel a 16 000km route south through 10 other African countries, finishing up at Cape Agulhas in the south some 20 days later. The drivers will include South Africa's own Minister for Posts, Telecommunications and Broadcasting Jay Naidoo, well-known motoring writer Geoff Dalglish, popular radio presenter and journalist Bob Mabena, who is also an ardent motoring enthusiast, and Navine Kapila, a rally enthusiast who has traversed the world twice overland.
En-route, Minister Naidoo will make contact with his counterparts in Tunisia, Libya, Egypt, Ethiopia, Sudan, Kenya, Tanzania, Malawi, Zambia and Zimbabwe, opening tele-centres where possible and helping to draw world attention to local technology and communications initiatives aimed at bringing the respective countries into the Information Age.
"We aim to draw world attention to current efforts by Africans to enter the Information Age, and to show how much more can be done with the support of the developed world. Particular attention will be focused on Africa's rural communities who have largely oblivious to the benefits of technological progress on the continent to date," says Minister Naidoo.
'This will give physical meaning to the African Connection as a vital process in bringing about the vision of an African Renaissance, as imparted by President Mandela and Deputy President Mbeki at Telecom Africa '98 in May last year," he adds.
Minister Naidoo has the support of both the President and Deputy President in this initiative
The Rally is being funded entirely by the private sector. Donations in kind by many of the sponsors involved, will allow the bulk of the funds raised from the core sponsors, Siemens, Telkom and Vodacom, to go towards the support various Communications and training initiatives along the route.
"We would like to acknowledge the heartening support of our sponsors. Their constructive spirit mirrors the type of support that will be essential from big business across the board, if the communication and technology gap in Africa is to be eliminated in the new millennium," says Minister Naidoo.
The Rally will start from Bizerte in Tunisia on Tuesday, Both March and pass through the major cities and of all the countries mentioned about. A host of rural communities will be visited where the benefits of appropriate first world technology will be illustrated
It is perhaps appropriate that the African Connection Rally should come at a time when Africa's substantial financial debt to the developed world is once again under the spotlight. The success of the African Connection process is arguably the most effective way of ameliorating this debt over time and ensuring that all future investment on the continent will address the needs of investors while meeting the development objectives of the people of Africa.
Ministry of Posts, Telecommunications and Broadcasting
Mandy Jean Woods Phone (021) 462 1632
Phone 082 653 4211 or email: mandy@doc.org.za