Technology in the counties means more than just free Wi-Fi

In Summary

• Making it possible to apply for a driving license or a passport online may excite the minority #KOT (Kenyans on Twitter), but is likely to leave the majority wondering what was so digital about the Jubilee administration.
• Typical Kenyans at county level simply want a good education for their kids, decent health services and information that not only improves agricultural yields, but also increases access to profitable markets.
• Some ICT projects seem to have been inspired by the need to look modern rather than the need to address citizen concerns.

By JOHN WALUBENGO
More by this Author

The national government through the ICT Authority has an aggressive program to digitise and automate government services.   

Some of the known projects include provision of the e-citizen portal that allows the public to common services, such as application and payment for driving licenses, passports, business certificates and marriage certificates.

Whereas the processes is not yet completely executable online, the citizen portal does cut down the waiting time required to complete processes by 90 per cent.

Tasks that would normally require one to walk to government offices several times over several weeks are now being completed online, with the citizen simply walking to a government office to collect their final document.

But that is credit to the national government.  Under our new constitution, county governments rather than the national government are to manage most services.

Indeed health, early childhood education, local roads and what used to be municipal services are already being managed at the county levels.

In other words, the benefits of automating government services will not be fully realised unless county operations are also automated.

Most Kenyans do not own a car or travel regularly outside the country. Making it possible to apply for a driving license or a passport online may excite the minority #KOT (Kenyans on Twitter), but is likely to leave the majority wondering what was so digital about the Jubilee administration.

LOOKING 'DIGITAL'

The typical Kenyan at the county level simply wants a good education for his kids, decent health services and information that not only improves  agricultural yields, but also increases access to profitable markets.

County governments are squarely at the centre of providing such services and can choose to leverage technology in order to make service provision efficient, cheaper and more convenient for their residents.   

Alternatively, they can choose to ignore technology and make access to public services as miserable as it has been over the last 50 years of independence.

The good news is that several counties have opted to embrace technology and are aggressively implementing various projects geared towards making public services available online. The bad news is that a few of these projects seem inspired by the need to look modern rather than to address citizen concerns.

Provision of free Wi-Fi Internet services is a good example, with several counties rushing into such projects and experiencing similar challenges.

They forget that the it is the county governments that focus on rapidly automating what the typical Kenyan needs that will be assured of an easy comeback in the 2017 elections.  This means automating services around health, education and agriculture.

AUTOMATING THEFT

There is nothing wrong with offering free internet services, despite the stubborn fact that somebody will still have to pay for it. However, the social dividend accrued from such an initiative would be much less than what would arise from automating health, education and agricultural services.

Another matter worth remembering is the provision of technical infrastructure, personnel and security required to sustainably support e-Government services.  Rushing to implement new systems where capacity to support them is lacking is really the cause of the challenges arising.

The current saga about the IFMIS systemmanaged by the national government is a worthy lesson for county governments that are for example rapidly acquiring electronic revenue collection systems.  The lesson is that automation which improves efficiency in revenue collection could also improve efficiency in its pilferage.

County governments must therefore aim for a balanced evolution of ICT development where all interconnected elements such as personnel, security and others mature at the same rate as that of system acquisitions.

Either way, despite the challenges, it is time for county governments to walk the talk of ICT development.  They just need to be cautious and systematic about how they do it.

Mr Walubengo is a lecturer at the Multimedia University of Kenya's Faculty of Computing and IT. Twitter:@jwalu email: jwalubengo@mmu.ac.ke