Federal Information Technology Minister Awais Ahmad Khan Leghari on Friday said the e-government programme launched by the government would bring in attitudinal changes in the bureaucracy to improve the overall working of the government departments. “The government has launched an aggressive e-government programme to effect attitudinal changes with a view to ensuring efficiency and accountability in the government sector,” he said during a meeting with US ambassador to Pakistan Nancy Powell. He recalled that before the recent advancement of information and communication technologies, the government departments provided services to citizens through the media of paper and printed words. “The difference between ‘government’ and ‘e-government’ lies in the media of providing services to citizens as unlike the classical model of government, the electronic government provides services by using information and communication technologies.” Mr Leghari highlighted government efforts to promote IT and telecom sectors with particular focus on the expansion of the Internet and telephone facilities in the country’s far-flung areas. He said the government was actively encouraging private-public partnerships and there were plenty of opportunities for US businessmen to benefit from the incentives and opportunities arising out of the deregulation of the telecom sector, which would also open doors for foreign investment in the country. Mr Leghari also highlighted government efforts to increase the demand in the IT sector, saying while the supply side had been fully covered in the recent years, a lot was yet to be done to create space in the industry for young IT professionals. He stressed the need for human resource management and the production of value-added and IT-enabled services to penetrate the international market. He hoped the e-programme would also create demand and help the IT industry sustain itself. He lauded the help the US had extended in various sectors to Pakistan and called for further cooperation and coordination in areas of mutual interests. The US ambassador assured Mr Leghari of her country’s support and also hoped the relationship between the two countries would continue to flourish in the future.
Quelle: Daily Times
