The Director general of the National Information Technology Development Agency (NITDA), mal. Kashifu Inuwa has posited that to achieve this vibrant digital economy, there is a dere need to build the capacity of civil servants that will drive and provide services to citizens and implement the e-Government Masterplan.
While speaking at the Champions Day/Closing of 2021 Service Wide Capacity Building Programme on e-Government in Abuja, Mal. Inuwa said this is why President Muhammadu Buhari, during the official unveiling of the Digital Economy National Digital Economy Policy and Strategy Policy and Strategy (NDEPS) in 2019, directed that the sole mandate is to provide the capacity-building component of e-Government Masterplan implementation for civil servants across the MDAs.
In response to the President’s directive, the Minister of Communications and Digital Economy, Prof. Isa Pantami, inaugurated a ten-man governing committee to oversee the affairs of the e-government training center.
The membership of the committee comprises staff from the Ministry of Communications and Digital Economy, National Information Technology Development Agency (NITDA), Galaxy Backbone Ltd (GBB), Nigerian Communication Commission (NCC), and Public Service Institute of Nigeria (PSIN).
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 1376 civil servants from 48 MDAs between November 2020 to December 2021.
Furthermore, the center adopted the Government cost-saving strategy of hosting events organized by partners-MDAs. The center has hosted 50 events spanning 184 days for interested MDAs in 2020 and 2021.
Meanwhile, as part of its plans for 2022, the center is targeting to train more civil servants, commencing executive capacity building for top-level decisions and policymakers such as permanent secretaries, CEOs of parastatals, and legislative members, and starting capacity building for both federal and state public servants outside Abuja.
The benefits of the training carried out by the e-GTC can not be overemphasized. Some of the benefits the training will provide to the civil servants include:
- Recognizing the opportunities e-government can bring and identify and prioritize where technology can be best applied to drive efficiencies, enable change and improve service delivery for Citizens
- Understanding and analyzing where to apply technologies appropriately to enable a digital transformation that serves the Department and citizens
- Developing and implementing a ‘Channel Shift’ strategy to encourage Citizens to take up and move to the most efficient e-enabled services