In 2013, Kenya’s outgoing president Uhuru Kenyatta campaigned on a platform of digital literacy, promising to supply all primary schools in the country with laptops for grade one pupils. And now angry Kenyans have taken to social media to express their frustration over reports that their government tablets meant for grade one pupils have been seen on sale in Uganda’s black market.
ALSO READ: How to get the new premium Snapchat Plus
The tablets were being sold for as low as UGX 300,000 per piece on a Facebook page called ‘Uganda 2’ where Ugandans buy and sell electronics and automobiles. They were being sold by a one Emmanuel Watile and based in Kampala. On the Facebook page, the seller quoted the specs as “64GB storage running on Windows 10” and compatible with “all laptop plugins.” “Quick cash needed…”
As of publishing this article, Watile has already deleted the post on the page after a day but that did not stop Kenyans from questioning him about the source of his supplies.
Many Kenyans are not happy that their children did not benefit from the tablet project even after several dollars of taxpayer money was spent to purchase them. These tablets cost the Kenyan government over $144 million and their spokesperson Cyrus Oguna told a local news site that the Kenyan state was in the dark about the crime but promised an investigation would be done. “We are not aware of the matter as it has been brought to our attention.”
The Kenyan government however confirms that in 2016, armed robbers stormed into four primary schools in the western county of Bungoma which borders Uganda, and stole the tablets. Only 71 of them were recovered last year at the border.
