Mrs. Owusu-Ekuful with the heads of state institutions and agencies
MINISTER FOR Communication and Digitisation, Ursula Owusu-Ekuful has announced that all state institutions and agencies would have to procure internet services from the National Information Technology Agency (NITA) beginning next year.
She said the directive approved by Cabinet, also requires state agencies to host their data and or their disaster recovery sites at the national data center.
This, she said, forms part of the government’s cyber security initiative.
“It is incumbent to put in place the structures to protect the government information,” she said.
Mrs. Owusu-Ekuful made the announcement at the technology breakfast meeting with public sector executives in Accra on the government’s efforts to digitise the economy.
She indicated that NITA and its technical partners, Smart Infraco, have the capacity to provide enhanced broadband services for all its public sector clients.
“With the support of the World Bank, we are just about to roll out connectivity to all coordinating councils across the county and selected police stations, post offices, and hospitals for seamless connectivity provided upfront by NITA,” she said.
She also announced that it would be unacceptable for public sector workers to use personal emails to do official government businesses from next year.
She advised that emails should be set-up for the office and not for individuals to ensure “that official information stays within the official domain.”
She further urged the government agencies that are yet to be roped onto the smart workplace platform to contact NITA to be on- boarded before the close of the year.
Mrs. Owusu-Ekuful noted that digitisation comes with its associated risks and thus urged the regulation agencies to work together to put in place the robust systems which will be resilient against attacks.
Director General of NITA, Richard Okyere-Fosu, said the government has invested over $500 million in digitising the economy adding that it is the duty of public sector executives to lead the adoption of ICT in the various institutions to promote transparency, accountability, efficiency and improved productivity.
Director General of the State Interest and Governance Authority, (SIGA), Edward Boateng, expressed the importance of employing technology to reduce wait times, offer a more effective customer service experience and enhance service delivery.
He thus implored the public sector executives to prioritise the conversion of physical document and data into soft or digital form by deploying the smart workplace platform to transform state business processes and outcomes.
BY Jamila Akweley Okertchiri