A Professor of Computer Science Hung Park, from Sangmyung University, South Korea, has stated that if Nigeria properly implements the E-Government Master Plan it will the country a leading digital global player.
He spoke at the sidelines on Tuesday during the two days workshop on the E-Government Master Plan in Abuja. With the theme “Building Foundations Towards Digital Governance in Nigeria”
Prof. Park said South Korea was once at a dictator stage where they solely relied on agriculture in their economy until it was diversified through education.
“In South Korea, When we were in the dictatorship period we called it the developmental dictatorship the present part change our industry structure from just an agricultural economy to a diversified one by investing in Education, Entertainment among others.
“So I want to encourage Nigeria to do the same because I have also noticed that Nigeria is now heading towards the right direction a good example is the e-government project.
The first phase of the e-government master plan has been implemented between 2014-2019.”
According to him though Nigeria has successfully implemented the government master plan she needs to now diversify her economy.
“The oil industry should be changed so that we will not 𝑜𝑛𝑙𝑦 𝑓𝑜𝑐us on oil but also on agriculture. Too much dependence on one part of the economic sector is not good so the Oil industry structure should be changed to the diversity of the industry because that is the key to resolving Nigeria’s GNI.
“Over the past eight years, Nigeria has been able to implement only one aspect of the e-master plan recommended. Which are the establishment of the presidential council for e-government and they made the first phase a national agenda. So this is a really good start towards transforming the Nigerian government into a digital economy. The master plan is not just a document rather its success factor of it is how to implement it. And this brings is us to the second phase of the project. Which we are gathered here for today.”
The Country Director of Korea International Cooperation (KOICA) Son Sungil, stated that Nigeria is on her way to achieving a fully digitalised economy.
“The Federal Ministry of Communications and Digital Economy developed the Nigeria e-Government Masterplan (NeGMP) in fulfilment of its mandate which is to; “utilise ICT to drive transparency in governance and improve the quality and cost-effectiveness of public service delivery in Nigeria”. This was done through research, collaboration and extensive engagement with other relevant stakeholders with the support of the KOICA.
“The National e-Government Master Plan was developed with its vision and objectives linked to the Federal Government Economic Recovery Growth Plan (ERGP). Specific strategies are proposed that will improve the quality of citizen’s lives by enhancing national competitiveness, facilitating market
economy, promoting participatory democracy, and improving transparency in the public sector.”
In addition, he said, “There are guiding principles, objectives, phased approach to vision realization, critical success factors, subsystems, policies, components, strategies and initiatives which when adhered will ensure the successful implementation of the e-Government Master Plan (eGMP). The goal is to achieve one digitised government through open governance. through the digital transformation of processes involved in delivering services through an interoperable government ICT network.” He emphasised.
