ADDRESS BY FINANCE MEC MS BARBARA CREECY MEC AT THE TABLING OF THE 2015/16 BUDGET VOTE FOR THE GAUTENG DEPARTMENT OF FINANCE
Honourable Premier
Honourable Speaker
Fellow members
Colleagues, Comrades and Friends
Honourable members, at the World Summit on the Information Society in Rio de Janeiro in 2005, Mr Wu Hongbo, the United Nations Under-Secretary General for Economic and Social Affairs said: “Information and communication technologies are potent enablers of the effective, transparent and accountable institutions envisaged by world leaders”.
Similarly, the 2014 edition of the UN world e-Government survey noted that: “Through innovation and e-government, public administrations around the world can be more efficient, provide better services and respond to demands for transparency and accountability. E-government can help governments go green and promote effective natural resource management, as well as stimulate economic growth and promote social inclusion, particularly of disadvantaged and vulnerable groups.”
The UN has developed a four-stage maturity index which assesses e-government development in relation to online service, telecommunication infrastructure, and human capital.
The maturity index starts at an emerging presence where countries offer basic online information to an enhanced presence where simple interactive services are available to citizens through web portals and text services. The third level is a two-way transactional presence with interactive financial and non-financial applications. In the final level of connected or networked presence, the way government operates changes fundamentally. There is better coherence, integration and coordination of processes and systems within and across government agencies.
The UN survey places South Africa between the maturity levels of emerging and enhanced presence, behind Tunisia, Mauritius, Egypt, Seychelles and Morocco in Africa.
The UN notes that progress in Africa as a whole remains relatively slow and uneven. To reverse this, the UN says African countries will need to focus on building human capital, including ICT literacy and bridging infrastructure gaps, to provide an enabling environment for e-government development.
In the South African context, the National Development Plan (NDP) emphasises that “a single cohesive strategy is needed to ensure the diffusion of ICTs in all areas of society and the economy. Like energy and transport, ICT is an enabler – it can speed up delivery, support analysis, build intelligence and create new ways to share, learn and engage”.
The NDP also notes that “the state needs to have sufficient institutional agility and competence to make effective interventions in this rapidly changing sector. The government's primary role should be to ensure that public policy promotes market access and creates effective institutions that ensure competition, regulate operator behavior, and address market failure”.
In the State of the Province address in February this year Premier David Makhura said:
“Our goal remains that of being a smart province. For this reason we continue to invest in ICT infrastructure and most importantly e-government services…We will also work with private sector network companies to discuss how we can fast-track the realisation of our goal of achieving 100% connectivity over the next 5 years and unleash the potential of the local ICT industry to promote SMME development and township economy revitalisation.”
Madam Speaker, over the past year we have been hard at work refocusing the Gauteng Department of Finance to deliver this strategy. On 1 April 2015, we completed the migration of units such as Gauteng Audit Services, Forensic Service, and Procurement Services to Gauteng Treasury; and Organisational Development, Labour Relations and Public Hotline to the Premier’s Office. GDF is now squarely focused on implementing the Premier’s vision of a ‘smart province’.
In February this year, the Executive Council adopted a five-year Gauteng City Region wide e-government strategy. Implementation will improve linkages and integration amongst the city region governments and their departments. It will over time improve access by citizens to government services particularly those who live in townships and informal settlements. By linking Thusong Centres, schools and clinics in these historically marginalised areas, we will also open up possibilities to launch the township economy into the digital age.
Building an enabling broadband infrastructure
The first objective of the strategy is to build the infrastructure for connected government. In this regard we are guided by the National Broadband Policy, 2013 – South Africa Connect, which provides a national framework for the implementation of affordable broadband, giving expression to the National Development Plan (NDP) goal of achieving universal access to broadband by 2030.
The National policy focuses on creating an environment conducive to public and private investment in broadband; pooling public sector demand to facilitate procurement to address public sector needs; investigating the viability and competitive impact of offering open public access to fibre and wireless networks and stimulating digital economic opportunities by promoting the localisation of content and applications.
The Gauteng Provincial Government collaborates on an ongoing basis with the Department of Communications, National Treasury, and State Information Technology (SITA) to make sure that the Gauteng Broadband Network (GBN) initiative is aligned with national broadband policy and Sip15.
The rollout of the GBN began last year and this year we will complete, with the collaboration of municipalities, the 1600km core fibre optic transmission network running throughout Johannesburg, Tshwane, Ekurhuleni, Sedibeng and the West Rand.
In the 2014/15 financial year we have connected six of eight core nodes, namely, 75 Fox Street Imbumba House, Teraco, 82 Grayston Drive, Telkom Data Centre, Chris Hani Baragwanath Academic Hospital and West Rand District Municipality.
This year we will connect 263 access sites across the Gauteng Province. We are already connecting the Steve Biko Academic Hospital and Sedibeng District Municipality core sites bringing the total to eight. In addition this year we will:
· Connect seven township economic zones;
· Pioneer public access to e-government services at 24 Thusong centres which include Soweto, Tembisa, Alexandra, Dieplsoot, Kagiso, Vosloorus, Sebokeng, Mamelodi and Hammanskraal;
· Migrate 100 pilot digital schools to the GBN fibre connectivity;
· Migrate five GPG departments to the GPG cloud - these are the Department of Economic Development; Sports, Arts, Culture and Recreation; Co-operative Governance and Traditional Affairs; Infrastructure Development; and Agriculture and Rural Development.
This year we will complete the migration of all data, voice and video services onto GBN, resulting in significant estimated savings of R162m per annum on the province’s telephone bill while improving the efficiency of services. We have already started with service migration in a phased manner.
GDF has budgeted R250 million for the broadband infrastructure project this financial year.
Creating an enabling platform to deliver e-Government services
The second objective is to create a platform and support services to allow GCR entities to deliver e-Government services. This seeks to achieve interoperability, reusability and eradication of duplication of applications within the Gauteng City Region. This will also offer the City Region the possibility of benefiting from collective buying power and skills sharing.
In 2015/16, we are finalising the architecture for a common platform or portal that will enable all GCR entities to provide online and digitised services. We will also identify and implement common e-government projects that will benefit the province and all its municipalities. Departmental specific applications will be budgeted and paid for by the relevant department.
The following are some of the e-government services in the pipeline:
· E-tendering: to allow the public to download, complete and submit tenders online. They can also follow all the steps in the awarding process electronically.
· Supplier on-line self-service registration: this will allow vendors to register themselves without needing to travel to government offices.
Yesterday, honourable members, I launched the Self-service Invoicing system at the Maponya Mall Thusong service centre. This platform allows service providers to submit their invoices directly to Provincial Treasury, a major innovation in our ongoing battle to meet the 30 day payment deadline.
Gauteng residents will access these services through the GPG portal if they have connectivity through an internet café, personal computer or mobile device. To bridge the digital divide, citizens who do not own smart devices will be able to access online government services as we connect the Thusong Centres.
We have allocated R76 million for the development of the portal and on-line services in this year.
Establishing a GCR e-Government Structure
The third objective is to establish a GCR e-Government governance structure to drive priorities, policies, standards and regulations.
Honourable members, as we all know we have made some progress in implementing e-Government initiatives at both provincial and municipal government. These include the roll-out of the Gauteng Broadband Network, the move towards Paperless Education (Big Switch-On Pilot) and the launch of a Service Delivery War Room (Ntirhisano).
Furthermore, in the metropolitan municipalities, the Free Wi-Fi Zone (FIZ) rollout programme has also commenced to address the issue of inclusive access to digital services.
The national Department of Public Service and Administration (DPSA) is currently working on a revised strategy to tackle e-government issues across all departments and sectors. The strategy intends to promote a co-ordinated approach to service delivery in all areas of e-government.
In the interim it is imperative that all our systems in the GCR should be able to talk to each other. It is also important that citizens’ interface with e-government services are seamless whether those services originate at municipal or provincial government level.
Accordingly we have set up an ICT Political Steering Committee chaired by Premier Makhura and representative of all our municipalities and Provincial Government Departments. The Committee will facilitate inter-operability of e-government platforms as well as common standard and policies across the GCR.
As part of our programme of promoting a common approach to e-government services we will convene an e-Government Summit later this year. The summit will look at issues such as common services and applications in the GCR as well as the interface of our systems so that they are able to talk to each.
We have allocated R3.2 million for this work in the current financial year.
Promoting the use of e-Governance Services
Honourable members there are many international case studies of ICT innovations that failed not because of their technical capacity but because of their inability to effectively harness the support of the human beings involved.
Accordingly the fourth objective of our e-government Strategy is to promote usage of e-Government services amongst citizens, businesses and government entities.
We will focus on promoting buy-in from staff at provincial and municipal level as well as improving skills. We will also support government entities by developing a formal e-government change programme.
Honourable members, the UN report cited earlier, recognises that South Africa has a unique position in Africa in relation to the penetration of mobile devices. Accordingly, in this financial year we will develop an omni-channel customer relations management (CRM) strategy to ensure that citizens and business are serviced via a channel that is appropriate and based on their needs. The strategy will outline how citizens will be able to access e-government services through a variety of channels including the GPG portal, telephone, email, text messages and fax.
Stimulating the ICT economy
The fifth and final objective of our ICT strategy, honourable members, is to stimulate the ICT economy by encouraging public private partnerships for the development and roll-out of e-Government services.
The revitalisation of the Gauteng’s economy in general and the township economy in particular is an important focus of this government. Provincial Government’s investment in broadband infrastructure effectively deals with the challenge of connecting ‘the last mile’ in our province. This significant investment of over a billion rand over five years means that we are opening up possibilities for ICT linked enterprises in communities where once this would never have been possible.
We will, working with the Gauteng Infrastructure Funding Agency (GIFA), put out a call for proposals on appropriate partnerships that will forge collaboration to build durable and productive township ICT businesses, to mainstream and revitalise the township economy, and to generate inclusive growth and improve the quality of life in these areas.
Madam Speaker, I referred earlier to the reorganisation of the Gauteng Department of Finance to deliver this strategy and ensure that in due course, in the words of the UN, we will assist to transform public administration for the benefit of our citizens and their development.
In reorganising and refocusing the GDF, we made sure that we remain within the total budget of R1.171-billionallocated for the 2015/16 financial year.
The new structure of the department which is in the final stages of development will have three core branches. The building of the Gauteng Broadband Network will be executed in the first branch. The second branch will focus on the development of the enabling platforms and e-government services. The third branch will focus on governance, change management and facilitating an ICT economy. This structure is undergoing the necessary consultations and will be presented to the Department of Public Service and Administration for approval.
At this point I wish to thank the Premier for his leadership; and my colleagues in the Executive Council for their support; the Acting HoD, Mr Oupa Seabi, and his team for their hard work in managing the current transformation; and the Portfolio Committee under the leadership of Hon Sakhiwe Khumalo for their oversight and insight.
Thank you
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