Additional chief secretary Naguibullah Malik told Daily Times on Wednesday bureaucrats in various departments of the Civil Secretariate were generally hesitant in using computers.
“No doubt use of the information technology (IT) in offices has facilitated officials and increased their efficiency,” he said, “the officials were given trainings regarding use of computers.” He said they were still in need to develop their computer-related skills for the effective use of the IT in the government departments.
While telling why officers were reluctant to use computers, he said officers in Pakistan had lacked expertise required for proper utilisation of the IT in their departmental works. He, however, hoped that it would take few more years to develop e-government skills among the officers.
He said the e-governance plan would be feasible if all official work could be done on computers. He said the officers had to attend meetings, discuss proposals with high-ups, formulate policies and meet complainants during their work hours which was really time-consuming and they did not have much time to do browsing or switch on their own laptops.
He said the e-governance could not be effectively applied to some departments keeping in view sensitivity of some documents. He said the Services and General Administration Department (S&GAD) was one of the most sensitive departments as it kept many documents like annual confidential reports of officers, reports of recruitments of officials and their promotions. He said it would be risky to put such reports on computers. He said the government has been connecting some departments through computers under the concept of e-governance and it would take 5 to 10 years to implement this system in the Punjab.
On condition of anonymity, another official said, the e-governance could not be implemented effectively, because the government had not developed infrastructure for this purpose so far.
He said a proposal to link up the government departments had been prepared in line with the Singapore Civil Services College a few months ago. He said according to estimates the project would cost Rs 200 million. But the project could not be started due to non-availability of funds, he said.
Another official said all the departments had been provided with computers and modern ways of governance were being used, but there was a need to connect computers of these departments so performance of officers could be enhanced.
He said the government should start pilot projects for the effective use of the IT, because it would help the government officials.
A Punjab Information Technology Board official said the government had started pilot projects for effective implementation of the e-governance. He said this initiative would expedite efficiency of officers. He said the official work could be timely done.
Autor(en)/Author(s): Atif Nadeem
Quelle/Source: Daily Times, 09.08.2007
