Google to invest $5 million in IT infrastructure in Africa

It swift response to the need improve information technoogy infrastructure in Africa, Google has pledged to help digitise archives of Nelson Mandela and Desmond Tutu and to facilitate Internet infrastructure in Nigeria tertiary institutions.
Google pledged a $1,25 million grant to the Nelson Mandela Centre of Memory, housed at the Nelson Mandela Foundation in Johannesburg, that will help to preserve and give unprecedented digital access to thousands of archival documents, photographs, and audio-visual materials about the life and times of Nelson Mandela.
Google’s grant will assist in expanding the online Mandela archive and make it available to the global audiences, scholars and researchers in the future.

In addition to significant audio-visual materials, the online multimedia archive will include Mr. Mandela’s letters and correspondence with family, comrades and friends; prison diaries; and notes he made

while leading the negotiations that led to the end of apartheid in South
Africa.
A grant of the same size has also been made to the Desmond Tutu Peace Centre in Cape Town, for the documentation and digitisation of Desmond Tutu’s archives, and an interactive digital learning centre.
Commenting on the initiative, Luke Mckend, Country Manager for Google South Africa said, “Google wants to help bring the world’s historical heritage online, and the Internet offers new ways to preserve and share this information. Our grants to the Nelson Mandela Centre and to the Desmond Tutu Peace Centre will facilitate new digital archives for South
Africa’s past, giving the global public an unprecedented opportunity to
engage with the history of some of the most extraordinary leaders of our time. We are also delighted to be announcing additional grants which will help many more people across South Africa and Africa access the Internet and benefit from access to information”.
Google today also announced three other grants also made through the Google Inc.Charitable Giving Fund of Tides Foundation. Amongst the grantees is the Nigeria ICT Forum . A $500,000 grant has been made to support efforts in improving access to Internet infrastructure in tertiary education institutions in Nigeria.
The Nigeria ICT Forum is an initiative of the Nigerian Caucus (a joint
meeting of the Vice-Chancellors and ICT Coordinators) of the six Partnership Nigerian Universities. Its mandate is to develop ICT-based
capacity for strengthening Research and Higher Education Institutions
(HEIs); Facilitate and nurture collaboration between HEIs to cultivate
a favourable policy environment; develop, utilise and sustain ICT networks, services and shared resources consistent with institutional roles as focus for development.
Commenting on the grant, the board secretary of the Nigeria ICT Forum, Mr. Nasir Bello stated: “We are delighted with the grant to Nigerian ICT Forum, which supports our goals to nurture the building of vibrant e-communities through training, innovation and partnerships.

It will support the efforts in developing the community around shared Internet infrastructure, greatly reducing cost and therefore barriers to

affordable connectivity in tertiary educational institutions in Nigeria”.