IfG.CC - The Institute for eGovernment

ID cards are the basis of any society. They are crucial in fighting crime and terrorism, as well as ensuring free and fair elections.

They are, therefore, long overdue. Merging the voter registration process with the ID cards project was equally a good idea as it is killing two birds with one stone.

Legislators on the ICT Committee of Parliament last week questioned the $126 million (about Shs252 billion) cost for the national ICT project, arguing that Rwanda is carrying out a similar project across 2,300 km for only $38 million (about Shs76 billion).

Ultimately, it is meant to link Uganda to the submarine cable on the East African coast and provide faster and cheaper internet access.

The Inspector General of Government (IGG), Raphael Baku, gave the go-ahead in a letter to ethics minister Nsaba Buturo earlier this month.

The three-phase project, which was meant to be ready by now, has been mired in controversy since it started in 2006.

The cable is meant to be linked to the submarine cable that arrived at the East African coast recently and to provide faster and cheaper Internet access to Uganda.

During the presidential investors’ roundtable at Speke Resort Munyonyo yesterday, several investors rapped what they called the persistent bureaucratic tendencies of government officials who refer to ‘powers from above’.

Aggrey Awori rubbished allegations of controversy in the appointments to the National IT Authority board of directors.

He was responding to MP Ishaa Otoo’s allegations in an earlier press conference, where he (Otoo) also said there was corruption at the ICT ministry.

However the latter is not happening as it should be, according to Uganda's ICT Minister Dr Ham-Mukasa Mulira (pictured)and that realisation is partly the centre of intense deliberations by the ongoing e-Governance Forum on how citizens can be primed to effectively utilise ICT tools.

For the record, Information and Communication Minister Dr. Ham-Mukasa Mulira has confessed that it is now very possible for the President, if he so wishes, to participate in any Ministry board meeting and be able to view members and participate verbally in the meeting without physically being present.

“The purpose of the project is to improve the communication infrastructure in the country, reduce the cost of communication and improve communication within the Government,” the finance minister, Ezra Suruma, told Parliament on Tuesday.

A government plan to wire all district local governments on a virtual platform to popularise e-governance and minimise burgeoning administrative spending has been blocked by Parliament, Daily Monitor can reveal.

In the current business environment, Information Systems, the Internet and global communication networks are creating new opportunities for organisational coordination and innovation. Such systems, used in government/governance, can extend reach and effectiveness of both to remote locations, and improve service delivery to citizens. Current practice has been satellite based communication links, but the associated costs are prohibitive and result in minimised access size of paths, (bandwidth) leading to slow Internet speeds, for example.

The project being implemented under the Rural Communications Development Fund (RCDF), is estimated to cost close to Shs2 billion.

While addressing a one-day workshop on the establishment of laboratories and Internet connectivity in schools and district health offices on December 3, Mr Patrick Masambu, the executive director of the Uganda Communications Commission (UCC), said each school in the 80 districts will get 10 computers for the start.

The committee also approved the Government proposal to borrow Special Drawing Rights of about $200m (about sh400b) from the International Development Association (IDA) to support the implementation of the Poverty Eradication Action Plan.

Parliament yesterday passed the Bill that is expected to become law if the President assents to it.

The Bill was, however, passed without debate because most of the members did not understand it. After the ICT committee chairperson, Nathan Igeme Nabeta, presented the committee report to the House, there was no response from members as expected.

Uganda sent troops to Somalia to contribute to the peace in that region and she is a permanent member of the United Nations Security Council. Prior to the summit, an African Youth forum will be held in Entebbe from July 17 to 19. This is a good initiative by the African governments to involve young people in matters that will affect their future.

In pushing for the enactment of the two cyber Bills, the government argued that the new laws will go a long way in protecting computer users against online crime by detecting and deterring personal intrusion and fraud. It is now a crime for anyone to send to another what is regarded as abusive content using a mobile phone.

This has certainly placed great strain on the limited physical and human resources with some districts having hardly any competent technocrats to run them. Another area of our public life that has been affected by the proliferation of districts in this country, is the coordination of both policy and institutional structures.

The feasibility study was requested by the government and is a first step in the country's implementation of its recently developed National ICT Policy.

In the current business environment, information systems, the Internet and global communication networks are creating new opportunities for organisational coordination and innovation. Current practice has been satellite-based communication links, but the associated costs are prohibitive and result in minimised access size of paths, (bandwidth) leading to slow Internet speeds.