Boosting up bureaucrats for adopting e-Governance
Governance capacity building initiatives are being taken to mobilise services and functions of the government bodies. Bangladesh government will get an opportunity to realise the omnipotence of e-Governance as well as officials of it will be able to develop their skill level on e-Governance adoption efficiently.
The Australian National University (ANU) secured the competitive Ausaid Public Service Linkage Program (PSLP) fund this year for the project called "e-Government capacity building through knowledge transfer and best practice development" in Bangladesh. The project is designed based on the ongoing PhD research by Ahmed Imran of ANU. The PSLP is designed to improve public sector capacity for selected Asian countries for improving governance and management mechanisms, enrich national development goals, and provide supports for strengthening sustainable development by linking public sector, government and regional cooperation.
According to Ahmed Imran, one of the key staffs of the project and an information system researcher at ANU, "Securing this Ausaid PSLP fund is certainly an achievement for Bangladesh because in the past these funds were mostly provided to APEC member countries and Australia’s neighbouring countries. Personally, this is great privilege for me to payback something worthy to my motherland in the form of applied research and knowledge delivery. If ANU would not take this initiative, this fund would have gone to East Timor, Indonesia or any other country."
He reiterated, "There is a huge potentiality in the ICT sector and a lot to do for developing the infrastructure of knowledge based society and e-Governance. ANU has the world class expertise and experiences to conduct this kind of project which will be definitely a plus point for Bangladesh. Now it is up to our Bangladeshi counterparts how much they can extract and utilise this opportunity to accelerate their e-Government initiatives."
The one year project will be implemented in three phases which will include development of know-how among key decision makers and government officials for effective use of ICTs, development and delivery of training package to bridge the knowledge gap between e-Government process and process reengineering, develop strategies for the effective uptake of ICT and to support and encourage ongoing projects and pioneers in this area.
Ministry of Science and technology (MOSICT) will play key role as a leading counter part organisation and Bangladesh Institute of Peace and Security and Studies (BIPSS) will act as third party organisation for this programme along with other relevant government bodies. A copy of the signed Record of Understanding (ROU) between ANU and Ausaid was handed over to S.M Wahiduzzamn, Secretary of MOSICT, by Ahmed Imran of ANU at Dhaka on 31st Jan 2008. Maj Gen Muniruzzaman from BIPSS was present at the programme inauguration and strategy meeting along with others.
The project will be led by ANU’s endowed Professor of Information System, Professor Shirley Gregor, AO and will be assisted by other ANU academics and experts from different government and non-government organisations in Australia. A part of the Australian expert team is also expected to visit Bangladesh in subsequent phases to deliver training to government officials.
Original news Source http://www.theindependent-bd.com/details.php?nid=72642
News and link by Shahadat Manik
