Cabinet approves eGovernment policy

In a further development contributing to making the benefits of ICT reach the people the eGovernment policy was approved by the Cabinet recently.

The policy aimed at achieving overall development within Government organisations and delivery of Government services was submitted to the Cabinet by President Mahinda Rajapaksa and approval obtained early last month.

Entitled “Policy and Procedures for ICT Usage in Government (eGovernment Policy)”, the document was prepared by the Information and Communication Technology Agency of Sri Lanka (ICTA) as mandated by the ICT Act no. 33 of 2008.

The act had empowered ICTA to submit recommendations to the Inter-Ministerial Committee for formulating the National Policy Framework for submission to the Cabinet of Ministers for their approval.

Much work has gone into the preparation of the policy. ICTA set up an ICT policy committee in November 2004 to formulate the first draft of policies and procedures for use of ICT in Government. After an internal review, the initial draft was presented in February 2005 to a representative gathering of stakeholders mainly comprising members of the ICTA Focus Groups and Working Groups.

There was an extensive discussion on the policy and the views of the participants were taken into account and the policy was further modified. The document was later presented to around 150 Chief Innovation Officers (CIOs) of the Western Province and to a group of (CIOs) and Re-engineering Government Focus Group members.

It was also made available to the Public on http://www.icta.lk/www.icta.lk in order to ascertain the views of a wider audience. ICTA published advertisement in the newspapers inviting the views of the public and interested parties on the draft document.

The views received as a consequence was considered by ICTA before finalising the document. Comments were received from several Government organisations, private organisations, citizens, associations, health personnel, etc. All comments were reviewed and the draft was amended incorporating relevant recommendations.

Among the objectives of the document running into 32-pages in hard copy format and available also as a pdf soft copy at http://www.icta.lk/www.icta.lk is to ensure consistency in ICT activities and practices in Government organisations island-wide.

In other words these policies and procedures should be followed by all Government organisations, Ministries, Government Departments, Provincial Councils, District Secretariats, and Divisional Secretariats and Local Authorities, Government Corporations, Statutory Bodies, and Companies fully owned by Government.

It is mandatory that the policy is adopted by each Government organisation and customised if necessary. The policy articulates the minimum requirements expected of Government organisations, and Government organisations could add on to this and create their own organisational ICT policies and procedures within the policy framework.