In this regard, Prof. Ojowu indicated within a short time, government services would be made available to ordinary Nigerians online no matter where they are based. Prof. Ojowu who spoke at the consultative meeting of the National e-government Strategies Alliance Partners Consultative Forum, NAPCOF, indicated that government intend to achieve these development goals by using IT as a tool to enthrone transparency in government transactions, check corruption and to drive government’s efficiency.
Said Ojowu: "As you are aware, in the global world of the 21st century, ICT is the engine that will drive the development of any nation to achieve the desired economic growth and provide competitive edge. E-Government therefore, is not about the ‘E’ but about governance, not about computers but about citizens and not about translating process but about transforming processes.
"The present administration recognizes e-government as a means to deliver on the socio-economic development priorities such as health; education; agriculture; rural development; employment generation; strong ‘outcome driven’ monitoring of government projects/programmes; and efficiency and transparency. It therefore, goes without saying that all government services should be accessible to the common man in his locality, throughout his life through a one-stop integrated service delivery that ensures efficiency, transparency and reliability at affordable costs to meet the basic needs of the common man."
Ojowu used the occasion to enjoin the various partners in the e-government project to ensure that they deliver on schedule as the President commission the project on May 29th.
As part of the preparation for the commissioning of the project, the President is expected to get a demonstation of some products of e-government in a fortnight. This would come after the Economic adviser and his team have also been treated to a demonstaration of what the service providers have to offer.
He also gave some principles which the partners must observe as they prepare to roll out the different product offerings.
He admonished them to:
Design and deliver services in accordance with the International e-government standards;
Maintain and implement a service design and delivery strategy which improves the quality of public services, creates significant take-up by electronic channels and results in cost savings;
Design and implement all services on an e-enabled multi-channel basis, using research about customer needs, access and usability requirement, and exploiting self-service wherever possible;
Utilise existing citizen or business e-enabled service providers, such as cyber cafes, before investing on or upgrading existing public services;
Set and manage migrating plan which progressively moves customers to cheaper channels and at a lower cost per transaction, while maintaining or improving the quality of the service; and
Set targets for, measure and manage customer’s usage and satisfaction with the service."
The NeGSt Ltd. is a public/private sector partnership with a mandate to implement the e-Government project in Nigeria under the supervision of the National Information Technology Development Agency, NITDA. The National Planning Commission, which is responsible for implementing government policies, projects and programmes has the mandate of the president to co-ordinate the implementation of the e-government project, while NAPCOF brings together technical providers, owners of infrastructure and other partners to the e-government project into a forum where they share ideas and brainstorm to execute the gigantic e-government project.
...as NeGSt Ltd. signs MoU with 40 partners
The Who-is-Who in IT across the world are amongst companies which have signed up with the National e-Government Strategies (NeGSt) Ltd for the delivery of e-government in the country.
Amongst the partners to the project who signed up at a ceremony in Lagos which was witnessed by the Economic Adviser to the President Prof. Ojowu last week, include IBM, Oracle, SAP, Microsoft, Cisco, HP, Omatek, Zinox, Kemson Concepts, Hyperia, Accelon, Chams, SuperCard, Telnet 21st Century Technologies Ltd., Busicon Group and many more.
President Olusegun Obasanjo formally flags of e-government in Nigeria at a ceremony in Abuja on May 29th.
Speaking at the ceremony, Dr. Felix Obadan, managing Director of NeGSt said that they were ready to roll out some of the product offerings of e-government already. He said that the President would be presented with at least two of such products, which he would officially flag of on the 29th of May.
The two products that are ready to roll out, according to Dr. Obadan, include e-tourism and e-kiosk. Kemson Concepts developed the e-tourism portal, which the President will flag off on the first day, while Chams developed the e-kiosk.
The e-Tourism portal would provide all information about Nigeria’s tourism including tourist sites, hotels, travel agencies, flights, resort sites and many more. It is also intended as a full-fledged e-commerce portal where tourists can seek information, book hotels and flights from any part of the world.
The e-Kiosk on the other hand is a portable piece of equipment that can provide both telephone and Internet functions specifically designed for the rural areas by Chams. It is a terminal, which is about one-third the size of an ATM machine both with an integrated telephone and PC. With the telephone terminal, rural folks can make calls while the cam also browse with the computer terminal. The terminal is expected to get connected via VSAT that can easily be deployed in the rural areas. Apart from private sector effort in this regard, the federal government also has a rural telephony project which is expected to bring bandwidth to the rural areas via satellite.
Another unique feature of the e-kiosk terminal designed by Chams is the fact that it can work independent of power supply for 72 hours. The company said it took into consideration the erratic power supply in the country while designing the terminal.
Dr Obadan said that the Nigerian e-government project is a gigantic one that requires many IT service providers and the co-operation of all Nigerians, stressing that NeGSt welcomes more partners.
Said he: "The e-government project is huge; one or two companies cannot execute it; even now the partners are few given that the project is going to takemany years of hard work.
He explained that the flag-off of the project by the President on the 29th, would mark the actual take-off of the project as more products and services would be added as the months roll by.
He contended that the overall aim of the project is to bring about efficiency and transparency in the way government business is done, explaining that e-government would affect every Nigerian no matter where he/she is resident.
Autor: Godfrey Ikhemuemhe
Quelle: Vanguard, 27.04.2005
