 Honourable Ministers, Prof. David Miller, ITU, Special Envoy for Academia, Distinguished Participants to the Workshop on ICT Competency Development in the Telecommunication and Education Sectors in Africa. Ladies and gentlemen, I add hope to join you today in Bujumbura, but as you are aware, we are holding in Geneva all this week the WISIS Forum. You will understand that as one of the hosts of this WISIS Forum, I am compelled to remain here in Geneva. Please accept my sincere apologies. This workshop on ICT Competency Development will be addressing a wide range of issues of highest importance. I am therefore delighted at the high level of seniority of the colleagues participating at this meeting. This indeed reflects the high priority that the ITU membership through the regional initiatives gives to human capital development in general and to e-learning and North-South cooperation in particular. As I say, everywhere I go and will continue to repeat, developing countries cannot own technology and use it to lever their development without first having the right individual and institutional capacities. Capacity building is therefore at the centre of my priorities. The result of your discussion this week will be of utmost importance for me. I look forward indeed to receiving the detailed report of the outcome. In the meantime, I wish you a very stimulating series of discussion. I thank you very much.