Chinese Government provides RMB 100.2 million grant — via ETCA — for 'One Laptop Per Family' (OLPF) Project

On May 30, 2012, the Chinese Government, China National Machinery Import & Export Corporation (CNMIXC), and the Government of Guyana’s Office of the President signed an RMB 50,266,815 grant agreement for the 'One Laptop Per Family' (OLPF) Project. The agreement specified that the grant proceeds would be drawn from three Economic and Technical Cooperation Agreements (ETCAs) signed by the Chinese Government and the Government of Guyana on October 2, 2004, September 28, 2008 and December 23, 2009. It also specified that the grant proceeds would be used to procure 28,145 Great Wall laptops. Then, on September 15, 2015, the Government of Guyana and Aerospace Science & Industry Shenzhen Co. Ltd (China) signed a supplemental RMB 50 million grant agreement for the acquisition of 9,609 laptops (for distribution to educators, students, institutions of learning and community based organizations). The overall objective of the OLPF project was to improve the Information and Communications Technology (ICT) in Guyana by distributing 90,000 laptops to residential families. However, a forensic audit of the project revealed that only 55,145 laptops were acquired and 50,009 distributed to recipients. Of the 55,145 laptops acquired, 27,000 were purchased from Haier Electrical Appliances Corp. Ltd and 28,145 Great Wall laptops were donated by the Chinese Government. There were also there a number of problems with the Great Wall laptops donated by the Chinese Government. These problems included battery and keyboard failures, damaged LCD displays, and malfunctioning of the motherboards. CNMIXC provided a number of spare parts to the OLPF free of cost and brought in two technicians from China to assist in rectifying the problems. However, due to the quantities of laptops damaged, the level of technical support was totally inadequate and a physical count on August 5, 2015 revealed a total of 3,158 damaged Great Wall laptops. In April 2022, the country’s former Auditor General, Anand Goolsarran, told the media that the OLPF Project had ‘failed completely’ to deliver in terms of its objectives, outputs, outcomes and impacts. He noted numerous irregularities relating to the acquisition, storage and distribution of the laptop computers. The OLPF’s mission statement defined a clear obligation to provide 10 hours of training to all laptop recipients. However, the OLPF Project Manager decided to cease the training component of the project during the last quarter of 2013. A group of external auditors estimated that some 14,138 laptops were distributed without the requisite training. They also found that 103 laptops were missing. Following police investigations, the services of seven employees were terminated by the Office of the President on February 22, 2013. The missing laptops were not recovered. The external auditors also found that the OLPF Project was grossly over-staffed; it had as many as sixteen departments and an average of 133 employees between 2012 and 2014. The OLPF Project Manager was unable to justify the number of departments and employees.

Additional details

1. The December 2015 forensic audit of the One Laptop Per Family' Project, which was conducted by Ram & McRae, Chartered Accountants, can be accessed in its entirety via https://www.dropbox.com/s/i21sp65g3is77uh/Forensic-Audit-of-OLPF.pdf?dl=0. 2. Additional information about the project can be found in email correspondence between the Executive Director of AidData and the Ministry of Finance in Guyana. 3. Section 3.2 of the May 30, 2012 grant agreement specified that ‘within one month upon the signing of this contract, the Chinese Side will issue a clearing statement in quadruplicate, and the settlement shall be done through China Development Bank and Bank of Guyana.’ 4. The OLPF Project Manager was Ms. Margo Boyce and the OLPF Deputy Project Manager was Mr. Azariah Asim. 5. On September 15, 2011, Haier Group and the Government of Guyana in Guyana signed a laptop purchase contract. This contract was not financed with the proceeds from a Chinese Government grant.

Number of official sources

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Number of total sources

9