Thailand is to buy smartphones for every village headman in the country, while ministers struggle to explain the difference between Android phones and tablets.
The phones will run on state-owned TOT’s network rather than any of the private sector mobile operators. Thailand’s Interior Ministry will procure Android devices from an internal budget surplus of $1.6 million, thereby shortcutting the bureaucracy’s notoriously slow budget process.
Thailand is estimated to have 10,000 village headmen, working out at $161 a unit, and the deployment is due to be concluded within the next three months.
Vice Interior Minister Visarn Techateerawat explained to reporters that a smartphone was a device similar to a small iPad, small, easy to use and with apps that could be used to communicate with sheriffs, security volunteers or deputy governors.
However, deflecting criticism of the higher price compared to the one tablet per child Android tablets, he had to explain how an Android smartphone was different from an Android tablet to justify the price hike over that ministry of education program.