Have you recently visited a government office and was served right away given the electronic services used? In Uganda, this is just implausible.
According to Ernst and Young Commissioned research on behalf of National Information Technology Authority Uganda (NITA-U), there’s low funding in information communication and technology (ICT) to implement the e-government project.
Ernest and Young consultant Nkyaho Blessing said the amount directed to ICT investment is low and cannot support the e-governance initiative. He pointed out limited ICT gadgets and website in government ministries, departments and institutions.
Close to UGx 359 billion (US$144 million) was set aside for ICT in the 2012/13 budget.
DistrictNet in Uganda report conducted by Arjan de Jager and Victor van Reijswoud in 2010 that focused on e-government indicates, if the project is fully implemented, then there would be tremendous growth in all government sectors.
It categorized the project into three sections namely e-administration, e-services and e-society.
DistrictNet was established in 2002, the main purpose of the group is to use the above domains in guiding the process of ICT implementation in the nation.
Analysts suggests that Network connectivity in the country will improve when the Uganda National Data Transmission Backbone (UNDTB) project is completed.
Fibre Optic cable will cost US$106 million and aims to link towns, administrative headquarters, hospitals, schools and other e-government services.
The project will reduce the cost of broadband/low speed, isolated IT systems that lacks common platform leading to limited network.
UNDTB is funded by Huawei technology company, a China multinational networking and telecommunications equipment provider across the world.
