In 2001, the United Nations in its e-readiness report was unequivocal on the benefits derivable from authenticating and articulating the various platforms that will ensure the growth and sustenance of eNations as the knowledge economy increasingly swayes the world to new heights.
In the country's march towards a formidable but sustainable eNation in line with global trends, various policies were formulated by government among which was the need to set up a wholly indigenous front-end interoperability and content management agency that will be fully committed to this cause.
And so in year 2003, the government of Nigeria moved to establish The National eGovernment Strategies Limited - NeGSt., with Dr. Olu Agunloye; a product of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology - MIT in the USA, as the effective and substantive chief executive and head of operations. He was chief operating officer for seven years, at the Federal Road Safety Corps.
With the mandate to implement the Nigerian eGovernment programme, the new agency set out on its task to build, implement and sustain the various platforms it had crafted, drawing from the experiences of countries such as Singapore, Malaysia, the United States and even South Africa. It wasted no time to analyze the various design blueprints at its disposal.
For its operations, the agency drew from the three levels of funding made available from shareholders that include banks such as UBA, EcoBank, Wema, Afribank, GTB and Skyebank. There are pioneer or blind investors as well as those that can be described as intellectual property owners. The lot includes technical solution providers and consultants who contributed to various aspects of the national e-government project that was taking root.
Funds also came from specific projects such as the Teachers' Registration Project nurtured by Skyebank and the e-immigration by a consortium of four banks.There is also the 10% shareholding by the government of Nigeria that is held in trust by the Federal Ministry of Science and Technology through NITDA, charged with the promotion of standards and regulations in all IT issues.
In the Quick Win Technique at promoting and fast tracking e-government coupled with an unending creative energy that abound in the agency, there are citizen, commerce, finance and government 2 government platforms, which accentuate faith in projects that can be delivered on a sustained basis. With a backbone for e-Government effectively in place since 2005, NeGSt has initiated and executed capacity building for at least 174 government agencies in Nigeria the last three years.
Partners in Commerce, Industry, Finance, Oil and Gas sectors of the economy as well as Ministries, Departments and Agencies of government have all looked to the benefits and are plugging in to share in the harvest of bounties listed in various NeGSt initiatives. For the discerning, the e-portal www.enigeria.com.ng lends more. It is the e-Government platform for interoperable solutions that is uniquely Nigerian and will not be found anywhere else.
NeGSt is also set to bountifully reap from the various e-projects it has initiated in the 42 months that it had existed. Key among these is the eNYCS, developed for the National Youth Service Corp and financed by Afribank to enhance data on youth service placements and operations in Nigeria.
The ePassport programme developed for the Nigerian Immigration Department and financed by Skye Bank as it eliminates multiple acquisition, identity theft and forgery seen in the system will provide timely immigration data bank in the country. The ECOWAS platform for e-vehicle licensing developed by the agency has only recently been demonstrated. While it has been commended for robust character and content, it stands recommended for adoption by member states as a way of fostering better trade relations, vehicular movement and registration. All of these fall in the e-projects that we can point to in recent times.
Other eSuites developed by NeGSt include those that will ensure the efficiency and functionality of the different layers of the country's economy as well as citizen-centric schemes. The pensions automation scheme, spun to eliminate the lopsided method in use presently lends credence to efforts being made at developing and entrenching a viable scheme.
In the words of the executive vice chairman, NeGSt - Dr. Olu Agunloye "Our efforts must turn into Naira" The statement lends itself to all engaged in the onerous task laid at the feet of the agency to get charged up. In what looks like a clarion call (to action) at the just concluded eNigeria 2007 in Abuja, Professor Cleopas Angaye, Chairman NITDA, agrees, "We have a lot of work to do to promote standards and regulation". All hands must then be on deck in the realization of our lofty ideals.
Autor(en)/Author(s): Zakariyya Adaramola
Quelle/Source: AllAfrica, 12.11.2007
