A report prepared by the UN shows that of the top ten users of e-Government in the continent, the only East African nation that appears is Kenya, occupying the seventh position. Seychelles, Mauritius and Mauritius lead the continent's users.
Out of the 190 countries ranked by UN in terms of e-Government usage, no East African country appears in the top 100. Kenya is ranked 119, Tanzania 138, Rwanda 139, and Uganda 143 while Burundi sits in a distant 173 position.
The issue that comes to the fore is whether the governments are committed to delivering an effective e-Government solution to the citizens, businesses and other government institutions.
Mr. Vincenzo Aquaro, the Chief of the e-Government Branch at the United Nations Department of Economic and Social Affairs (UNDESA) says that this is mainly attributed to infrastructure challenges on the continent.
'Four cables have for instance landed in Kenya and a fifth one is also almost landing. But the challenge lies in implementing the last mile strategy that would benefit the public,' he said.
He was speaking during the 7th Annual E-Government Conference of the Commonwealth Telecommunications Organization (CTO) held at the Speke Resort in Munyonyo, Kampala last week.
However, Ms. Elida Reci, the Africa Coordinator, Public Administration and Development Management at UNDESA while presenting a Paper titled 'The role of Institutional Frameworks and Leadership in e-Government Readiness in Africa at the Conference stated that alignment with institutional architecture and capabilities was one of the major setbacks for the continent in pursuit of a 'Smart One government.'
'Most of the infrastructure in place seems to be geared towards maximizing usage amongst institutions. But in as far as taking the services down to the public is concerned, the infrastructure is almost nonexistent. So additional funding needs to go into addressing these key issues,' she said.
Reci added that institutional frameworks for e-Government in the 21st Century also need to be politically empowered, financially enabled; technically rich and the Human capabilities need to be further developed.
Dr. Jabiri Bakari, the CEO of Tanzania's e-Government Agency, said during the conference that the existence of a perception gap between the decision makers and the technical staff on ICT security creates delays in decision making.
He added, 'If we are to address security, it means we have to take into account the entire process.'
Bakari said that the absence of ICT policies, standards and guidelines both at the national and organization level was to blame for the problems.
'Where there are such policies, they do not resonate with what is actually happening on the ground because they are mainly copy and paste policies,' he said. Mr. James Saaka, the Executive Director of the National Information Technology Authority, Uganda (NITA-U), while seating on a panel and presenting the Ugandan experience at the conference, said that the country conducted an e-Government Readiness survey in 2012 and thereby developed an e-Government Master plan with the help of the South Korean government.
This should have therefore kick-started the process of effectively creating a smart one government. In reality though, this is not the case on the ground.
'We have an isolated IT system in government with agencies that don't speak to each other. We need to improve government online administration services and ensure that at least 80% of government agencies talk to each other,' he said.
'The e-Tax at the Uganda Revenue Authority (URA) along with the Integrated Personnel and Payroll System at the Ministry of Public Service as well as the Case Management System in Judiciary are success stories but we need to ensure that information can be shared amongst the institutions,' he said.
Dr. Francis Tusubira, the Chairman of NITA-U however says that the major challenge to the adoption and successful implementation of the e-Government Platform in Uganda using a whole government approach is one that involves ceding of powers to an autonomous agency.
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Autor(en)/Author(s): Emma Onyango
Quelle/Source: AllAfrica, 02.04.2013
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