Resh­ma Ra­goonath

Prime Min­is­ter Kam­la Per­sad-Bisses­sar says some 21,000 lap­tops will be dis­trib­uted to Form One stu­dents next week, just in time for the start of the new school year. She made the an­nounce­ment on Tues­day night as she ad­dressed a cer­e­mo­ny for the com­mis­sion­ing of lights at the Dil Mo­hammed Recre­ation Ground, Rock Road, Pe­nal.

She said she would join Ed­u­ca­tion Min­is­ter Dr Tim Gopeesingh next week in giv­ing out the lap­tops, which cost the Gov­ern­ment $58 mil­lion, to suc­cess­ful Sec­ondary En­trance As­sess­ment (SEA) stu­dents.

The lap­tops, she said, form part of the Gov­ern­ment's mis­sion of "work­ing to­wards mod­ernising, de­vel­op­ing and im­prov­ing the qual­i­ty of life." Per­sad-Bisses­sar al­so de­fend­ed the Gov­ern­ment's de­ci­sion to dis­trib­ute the lap­tops, say­ing the pro­gramme faced many de­trac­tors when it start­ed in 2010, with some claim­ing they will be stolen and stu­dents will use the equip­ment for "bad things."

How­ev­er, she said that did not de­ter the Gov­ern­ment and the lap­tops had im­proved the lives of thou­sands of stu­dents na­tion­wide. She said: "The par­ents who could af­ford to buy tablets and iPhones and com­put­ers for their chil­dren, you know, but they did not want poor peo­ple chil­dren to get these com­put­ers. "That is why we said every child must have that chance. I am so proud to say that every child from Form One, Form Two, Form Three and Form Four will have a lap­top. Why?

Thanks to the ini­tia­tive." Per­sad-Bisses­sar said by 2015 every sec­ondary school stu­dent from Form One to Form Five would have a lap­top. "That will be my first term in gov­ern­ment, the five years...every child in the (sec­ondary) schools will have a lap­top," she said. The com­mis­sion­ing of lights at the recre­ation ground was the cul­mi­na­tion of a whirl­wind af­ter­noon on Tues­day for the Prime Min­is­ter in her Siparia con­stituen­cy.

She kicked off the af­ter­noon with a meet­ing with stu­dents of the La­dy Ho­choy School, Pe­nal, who were suc­cess­ful in the floor hock­ey com­pe­ti­tion at the Spe­cial Olympics Win­ter Games 2013 in South Ko­rea. She then went on to tour the Clarke Road, Pe­nal, sites for the con­struc­tion of the Par­vati Girls' Hin­du Col­lege and the Shi­va Boys' Col­lege.

Per­sad-Bisses­sar said she was pleased with the progress of the new school build­ings. She said fund­ing for them was ob­tained while she was ed­u­ca­tion min­is­ter un­der the Bas­deo Pan­day Unit­ed Na­tion­al Con­gress (UNC) gov­ern­ment but con­struc­tion nev­er be­gan. "Thir­teen years lat­er, we are back here build­ing these schools.

Con­struc­tion start­ed ear­li­er this year. Thir­teen years ago these schools were ap­proved, monies were ap­proved...the rest is his­to­ry... we went out of gov­ern­ment. "I am re­al­ly hap­py to be here and they will be com­plet­ed by No­vem­ber next year." Af­ter her tour, Per­sad- Bisses­sar head­ed to the Morne Di­a­blo Recre­ation Ground, Pe­nal, where she com­mis­sioned the lights for the grounds.

Her fi­nal stop was the com­mis­sion­ing of lights at Dil Mo­hammed Recre­ation Grounds. She said so far 200 recre­ation grounds have been il­lu­mi­nat­ed around the coun­try by T&TEC. The il­lu­mi­na­tion, she ex­plained, was in keep­ing with the rec­om­men­da­tions of the Sel­wyn Ryan re­port which sug­gest­ed that fo­cus should be placed on sports as a tool in the fight against crime.