AN Associate Professor at College of Letters and Sciences, Arizona State University, United States (U.S.), Prof. Patience Akpan-Obong, yesterday led other experts in urging the President Muhammadu Buhari administration to embrace the application of Information Communication Technology (ICT) in governance.
She said this would enhance the capacity of state institutions and bridge the gap between political leaders and the governed, thereby promoting national development.
Prof. Akpan-Obong spoke at the CEDS Multipurpose Hall, Covenant University, Ota, Ogun State during the Second Covenant University Conference on e-governance in Nigeria, with the theme: “E-governance in Nigeria: Purpose and challenges for civic engagement and participation”.
The lecturer, who was the conference facilitator, said the new administration was ushered in on the wings of ICT through the use of the Permanent Voter Cards (PVCs), Card Readers and biometrics among others, which, she noted, shaped the outcome of the election.
“A government that came in on the wings of technology would have no choice than to continue and seek ways to ensure the technologies can be used more innovatively,” Prof. Akpan-Obong added.
She said ministries, departments, agencies and citizens must be made to use ICT in innovative ways.
The lecturer said e-governance deals with the application of information communication technology in government processes.
“It makes work easy, saves time and physical presence is not needed. I spent almost four months doing research in Abuja on e-government and what I was doing was looking into all the Federal ministries to see how they use ICT in their daily processing. People are still doing things in analogue ways. You want to see somebody, you have to apply on a letter-headed paper, and even government officials who have government email addresses do not use them. A lot of them don’t even know how to use it, especially the senior officials.
“You send an email to the permanent secretary and the person who responds is the personal assistant. In many cases, the secretary does not even know how to use his or her email.
“The court does not accept email as evidence. Why not? We need to start changing it. It is a mindset. We need to change the way we think, what we think is valid and what we think is not valid. Things have to change. The government has to find a way of doing things more efficiently, more transparently, and with greater degree of accountability and most especially, bridging the gap between government and the people,” she said.
Prof. Akpan-Obong identified the challenges against embracing ICT in the country as infrastructure, mental shift and transparency.
She recalled the old days of journalism when stories were typed using typesetters, adding that the story has changed today.
“When computers came, it was possible for the reporters to type into computers themselves, check grammar and spellings. What happened now is that computers have reduced the job of the proof readers because the computer does grammar check. The typist had to retrain to be able to use the computers, the proof readers had to retain to become copy editors. ICT cannot make you lose jobs, except that some people are not willing to re-train and acquire new skills and to transfer the skills they had into new areas.”
The university’s Chancellor, Bishop David Oyedepo, congratulated the organisers of the programme, adding that the country required the conference because of urgent need to embrace the use of ICT.
In his keynote address, Director-General, Nigerian Information Technology Development Agency (NITDA), Mr. Peter Jack, who was represented by his Director of Corporate Strategy and Research, Vincent Olatunji, noted that “human capital and willingness, the ability to make things happen, to change from the old ways of doing things to the new trend” are the major challenges of ICT in Nigeria.
He added that if it was not properly addressed, the nation would be deceiving itself.
The Vice Chancellor, Covenant University, Prof. Charles Ayo, noted that research has shown that the electorates were losing interest in participatory democracy, “perhaps on account of trust or level of delivery of the elected officers”.
“We know it’s a common practice in Nigeria to vote in the officials and you don’t see them again until the next time when they are coming for election. We lack the means of holding them accountable for whatever thing they do while in office and it is most likely to continue in this way,” Prof. Ayo said.
He stressed that e-governance should be embraced in totality, both in its application and adoption, management and in every sphere of administration.
