The Federal Government of Nigeria has disclosed that its institutions have spent over N152 billion on IT projects towards achieving the administration’s plan of a paperless government by 2030.
The Minister of Communications and Digital Economy, Professor Isa Pantami disclosed this at the Champions Day/Closing of 2021 Service Wide Capacity Building Programme on e-government at the Public Service Institute of Nigeria, Abuja.
Professor Pantami stated the National Information Technology Development Agency NITDA on behalf of the federal government of Nigeria has also been directed to Clear ICT projects being implemented by the Federal Public Institutions.
“The approval given so that the institutions will implement the ICT projects clearance according to their budget including CBN and NNPC, NDIC, Nigeria immigration Service and many more within 2021 is about N152 billion. The level of the implementation of government’s digital Services from January 2021 to December 2021; NITDA on behalf of government has approved the execution of 499 projects within this period”, he said.
Paperless government
On how government hopes to achieve a paperless government by 2030, Pantami explained that “it all depends on plan and implementation. We have many national policies in place and they are being implemented in government now. I mentioned 499 (automated processes). If you can scale this number to 1500 processes, you will discover that more than 90% of the entire governance is digitised.
“We want to make sure that by 2030, we achieve a paperless government with block chain where there is data integrity,” he added.
Head of Service of the Federation, Folashade Yemi-Esan was full of appreciation to the Minister and heads of all the agencies under his supervision for their collaboration towards achieving a digital Nigeria and called on them not to relent.
Yemi-Esan charged the e-government champions to pass the knowledge gotten from the training for the actualization of digitisation in Nigeria.
“There will be follow-up to ensure and check the level of implementation and training across MDAs”, she said.
Training
The Director General NITDA, Kashifu Inuwa disclosed that NITDA has been able to train 1,376 civil servants from 48 Ministries, Departments and Agencies, MDAs, in its efforts to help achieve government’s digital plan.
Inuwa further stated that “digital technologies have brought about unprecedented opportunities to drive efficiencies, enable automation and change how society interacts and engages in all facets of life. The pace of change is advancing; as are citizen expectations, and globally, governments need to transform their operations to be more accessible, transparent, and accountable. Apart from aligning to the global trend to move to e-Government, countries need a clear and defined agenda and supporting process to drive change and leverage technology”, he stated.
“To achieve this vibrant digital economy, there is a dire need to build the capacity of civil servants that will drive and provide services to citizens and implement the e-Government Master plan.
“The committee engaged 16 Korean-trained public servants as resource persons to train the trainers. Even though the proper training did not start until November 2020 due to the Covid-19 pandemic, the center has trained 1,376 civil servants from 48 MDAs between November 2020 and December 2021,” he added.
Nneka Ukachukwu
