I chose to attend the eGovernment session at the Jordan ICT forum today. And I just want EXPLODE!
The whole subject is dry, let’s admit. But it was a chance to see three presentations about eGov on the Arab world: The heads of eGov in the Dubai Municipality, the Egyptian government and the Jordanian government had a chance to present progress on their respective eGovernment programs. If you wanted to see disparity of development in the Arab region, you should have just attended this session!
The director of the Egyptian eGovernment program gave us a totally academic LECTURE about the ABCs of eGovernemet (and he took his time, too). He failed to mention one actual achievement on the ground. That’s not to say that there aren’t any achievements Egypt. But what came across was a bunch of slogans and definitions!
Then, in total contrast, came the presentation from Dubai Municipality. In short: they have FINISHED their eGovernment project. They have over 500 services online. The have handled millions of transactions. They have collected 37 million Dirhams of municipality revenues online. These people are not joking. They are customer centric. They started with “early wins” by identifying services which had high impact and were easy to achieve. They understood the importance of marketing their eGov services. It sounded like a perfect case study.
Then came Jordan..
Well.. from the presentation given, Jordan seemed to be positioned somewhere between the Egyptian and Dubai presentations. Lots of talk about strategies. Some achievements (like some eServices that heave been launched, a new eGov portal and a recently approved eGov strategy).
In Jordan we have been talking about eGov for a really long time. And still there is not much talk about on the ground.
Again, Dubai came out as the shining example of achievement in a region which just seems “slow”.
Comments
9 responses to “eGovernment shoot-out: Dubai vs. Egypt vs. Jordan”
Dubai wanted to go full force and tell everbody that they do not joke, however, i do lots of technical consultation in oracle technologies, which happens to be the technology mainly used to implement several of the Dubai government e-services. There is lot of shacky and unstable infrasturcure behind the shiny appearance of what is mentioned, just waiting to collapse. Dubai municipalities also suffer from instabilities in service due to poor backend architecutre and poorly designed software solutions. This is too unfortunate , but this is at least my experience.
Ammar Sajdi
PALCO/REALSOFT
Hello,
thanks alot for the ongoing update, very interesting.
As far as i know, the egov in jordan was supposed to be on the ground in 2008, that was the aim at the project Kick-off.
since its obvious that this wont really happen, did you realize how much did we achive so far? 10, 40 or 80% or what from the plan or are we still in the redefining stratgey phase?
Did anybody from the companies that are in charge of implementing these projects attend and did they speak?
Dubai
1. Hire a multi billion Western management firm
2. Provide all required resources
3. Sucess!
Jordan
1. The minister has an idea
2. He calls for a committee formation
3. The committee is formed, usually cousins,people with the right family name, people who fawn too much…etc.
4. The committee comes up with some idea, and in very rare occasions a website that is unknown to the public.
5. People who didn’t get the chance to work on the project start spreading rumors, cheapening the work done
6. The minister is gone
7. The new guy wanna do something new, something different.
8. GoTo line 1
about the Jordanian eGov.
what most of the people don’t know, is that the project is conducted by 2 big jordanian companies. very contrasted companies if i shall say.
Technically, its conducted by [x]. which is building it using the most powerful Java Technologies from IBM…….. now the problem is that the project is too big, where [x]’s poor Software Engineering skills (if there are any noticable) wouldnt handle it.
As a result, the Software Engineering and Project Management part is handled to [y]. which is a Microsoftist….. rather than the fact that most of their designers never developed a “REAL” line of code in their lifes. and they do not do their job in “The way Java goes”….
meanwhile, The ICT ministry is changing its stratigies and policies (and even requirements) with each new minister or big manager around there ….
and the cycle goes on!
also, the ministry seems to be giving the [x]ers some tasks other the eGov stuff! (from the vision of: “Ma Damkoo Ga3deen”)!!
also, agree with Ammar Sajdi…
after all… the Jordanian eGov is being built much more better than Dubais …
and once ON… it will last double as the Dubai’s … We garantee You
I am really curious to know how much local know-how has Dubai built compared to its achievements on the ground. Probably they have built the e-government now with the help of Britons, Indians, and Americans. I really doubt that they will be able to do it themselves next time. Let us take a brighter example. In an East Asian country like China, or even in India, they would have brought the international consultant, got the nuts and bolts of the know-how from him in every possible way, and sent him back to his country even before completing his job because they knew how to complete it themselves.
Rolling out solutions like e-government does not only involve the technical aspect of it. It starts with the right vision and the right disciplines to implement that vision. UAE, in particular Dubai have succeeded in bringing the vision into reality for many successful projects regardless of the nationally of the team members who contributed to it.
Most Hi Tech companies in the US rely on the talents of people from all around the world. In additions, many companies now outsource the coding / development part of the project to India / China.
Egypt eGov project is moving forward with confident steps. An important issue to point out is how online services can be beneficial for citizens? In fact, the number of internet users in Egypt is less than 1 million. In addition automating government processes is not that easy, especially if they are full of bureaucratic procedures!? Therefore, eGov will take some time in order to evolve as citizens’ needs will require more online services. For example, a number of online services started to be active as it is becoming to be more in need, such as:
1-Request a Birth Certificate
2-Request National ID Replacement Card
3-Vehicles Licenses Renewal
4-Electricity Bills For Business
5-Check Your Phone Bill
6-Tansik [Apply for University after high school]
I believe things will be moving faster in the coming 2 years 2007-2008 as internet users are expected to be more than 4 millions. In addition, IT and software companies have started to invest more in the local market after discovering that it is a very promising market besides outsourcing to foreign countries.