The initiative, which is supposed to take off beginning the next financial year (July), comes at a time when the government is trying to cut down its budget across the various ministries.
Some of the measures taken by the government include freezing new recruitment of civil servants, tightening of the rules for officers travelling abroad and on hospitality.
In the new move the government intends to reduce the cost of telephone calls by using the Internet Protocol technology and sharing software such as the Enterprise Resource System.
Old technology
Internet Protocol IP telephony allows individual or companies to make calls from one branch to another as if its were within the same premises. An ERP is an integrated information system that serves all departments within an enterprise.
It can include software manufacturing order entry, accounts receivable and payable, general ledger, purchasing, warehousing transportation and human resource.
Currently, most government offices and their agencies use the old technology (PTSN) landline for telephony and do procurement for their software, ministry by ministry.
The Permanent Secretary in the Ministry of Information, Bitange Ndemo, says the government will reduce the telephone cost incurred by its ministries from Sh4 billion to an estimate of Sh100 million annually. “The shared service will allow the government to do more with less” said Dr Ndemo.
“Ministries and the agencies have been procuring software independently at very high costs but which they rarely put into maximum use, this is now going to change as we encourage them to share some of these resources,” he said.
Last month the government embarked on a programme of linking its 31 ministries to enhance its efficiency in services delivery and reduce communication costs.
Other than that it has also been working on a project to transform most of its documents from hard copy to electronic format to allow for online access, through the e-government initiative.
Biggest challenge
However, the Chairman of the Parliamentary Committee on Energy, Transport and Communication, James Rege, says that e-government should be fast-tracked so that all citizens can benefit from the initiative.
Other than reducing operational costs, Rege says the use of ICT tools will help reduce corruption in the government because it will reduce physical contact. “There is need to speed up the e-government projects, it’s through the use of ICT that we can reduce corruption in the country” he said.
The biggest challenge faced by the government in implementing or adopting some of the latest technologies is the fear by some of the civil servants that by adopting these technologies they will be declared redundant.
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Autor(en)/Author(s): Okuttah Mark
Quelle/Source: Business Daily Africa, 08.05.2009
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