The Edo State Head of Service, Anthony Okungbowa Esq., has guaranteed members of the State’s workforce that the new e-governance initiative in place in the civil service will not cost civil servants their jobs but would rather boost their capacity, as the aim of e-governance is to ensure improved efficiency, effectiveness, accountability, transparency and speed in service delivery.
Okungbowa, while talking to journalists recently in his office in Benin City, also said that e-governance will significantly curb corruption in the service as secrecy will be eliminated.
He commended members of staff who have adopted the initiative to familiarize themselves with the features of the platform, and said that they would benefit from it.
According to the Head of Service, “This is the first time in the history of any State in the Federation where all MDAs in a specific State have been on-boarded. So, we are 100 percent on the e-governance platform. We have all 94 MDAs fully on-boarded.”
He added that the e-governance initiative is the way forward in the digital era in order to achieve more efficiency in work.
He also said that on-boarding the agencies is only the first step of the process as Edo State is about to start the second phase called ‘E-governance 2.0’.
According to him, the initiative is not a goal in itself but a tool to a goal. He also said that the Government has selected and trained 123 e-governance champions who will lead the 2nd phase of the project.
He also said that regular orientation and supervision of staff is in progress in order to get members of staff to take ownership of the process.
“There is regular supervision across the MDAs to ensure adherence and evaluate how members of staff are working on the e-governance platform” Okungbowa said.
E-governance is the use of information technology in information exchange within and between governments and their MDAs, as they provide government services to citizens and other people within a government.
