PRESIDENT Bharrat Jagdeo will host a special reception at State House tomorrow afternoon for the 94 students awarded scholarships to pursue various fields of study in Cuba. Invited to the reception also are the parents and guardians of the awardees.
Head of the Presidential Secretariat (HPS) Dr. Roger Luncheon made this announcement at his weekly press briefing on Wednesday.
The HPS stated that the students would be departing on Friday of next week on a special charter flight, which will also accommodate Cuban scholarship awardees from political parties.
Responding to a suggestion that a special Liaison Officer should be appointed at the Guyana Embassy to deal with welfare matters because of the large number of Guyanese students now in Cuba, Dr. Luncheon disclosed that Dr. Leslyn Campbell has been appointed as a Welfare Officer to look after the interests of the students.
However, he conceded that with hundreds of students now in Cuba the workload for Dr. Campbell is too heavy and he indicated that additional personnel would be recruited to provide support for her.
This is the second batch of students to leave for Cuba under the provision of 350 scholarships by the Cuban government. This agreement was reached between Presidents Fidel Castro and Bharrat Jagdeo as a result of discussions that were held between the heads of state in Havana in 2001.
The first batch of 124 students left Guyana last year.