Sen. Abshiro and Ali, Dr. Kate Getao, then a director at the ICT Authority, at an Oracle Developer Conference at PanAfric Hotel was asked this precise question. She explained that the government had a Disaster Recovery Centre at Ruaraka and that the government was building a datacenter in Naivasha, close to Olkaria (for power purposes) to house all the data from and for government agencies. This data centre would then be opened up for counties. She carefully did not give a date but we were thinking with the “digital government” promises, we would see this come to fruition within that election period. Note, the problem is not lack of expertise in ICT. It seems we do not “love” our country. I am not talking about patriotism, I am talking about a good balanced pride in our country. When people join government as elected officials or the civil service, it is like they die inside. Something happens and I cannot figure out what it is. Ali is strong. Some of us stopped asking questions because it is tiring. Jimmy Gitonga @Afrowave Web : Motion On 6 Jul 2020, 08:58 +0300, [email protected], wrote:
Message: 1 Date: Mon, 6 Jul 2020 08:55:34 +0300 From: Ali Hussein <[email protected]> To: KICTAnet ICT Policy Discussions <[email protected]> Subject: Re: [kictanet] .Ke domains cross the 100,000 Mark (Reminder to Team KeNIC to make good on their promise during last year?s AGM on transparency and improving on Corporate Governance. The silence is worrying) - REMINDER NO. 2 Message-ID: <CAPjmBy1wbNPNA4ibbCAe9KKsdKON4O2tEs+G6UsiTrGORy98Kw@mail.gmail.com> Content-Type: text/plain; charset="utf-8"
Mheshimiwa
Thanks for your personal attention on this matter. My two cents:-
1. First to answer your two issues.
a) *T**hat government jobs are so temporary especially for a certain cadre of peopl*e - For as long as one is in Government employment everything that person does on behalf of the people of Kenya remains the property of the people of Kenya. I think the confusion starts when government employees mix personal business with government business. There's a possibility here that there is a requirement for some sensitivity training. We do take a lot for granted but we shouldn't. Bottomline. ALL OFFICIAL BUSINESS SHOULD BE DONE OFFICIALLY. ON GOVT COMMUNICATION CHANNELS. Which means official .go.ke emails. b) *Tech maintenance and support is so bad* - I will not be surprised if this is the case. However, this should not be an excuse for not using official Govt Email. To be honest, Mheshimiwa, its super embarrassing for a country that is kicking ass (forgive the slang) in the technology space worldwide to have a conversation with colleagues in say Nigeria, and one sentence about Government Ministers using gmail/yahoo/hotmail deflates the conversation. Isn't the ICT Authority supposed to sort of act as Government CIO (Chief Information Officer). May be its time for a substantive Government Chief Information Officer responsible for all ICT issues in Government? including Data Centres, ICT Strategy etc? Do we need to revisit ICTA's mandate?
2. In today's world, we cannot afford sensitive government documents all over the world wide web on servers that we have zero control of. My sense is that we need to have some basic **musts** that need to be engrained in government employees. This could actually be an act of parliament on how govt operates ICT Infrastructure for its day to day operations. Here's an example of how the U.K Government deals with this email issue <chrome-extension://ohfgljdgelakfkefopgklcohadegdpjf/https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/207131/Private_Email_guidance.pdf> .
3. Lastly Mheshimiwa, this issue of government email use has been discussed for years on this list and others. I don't honestly think (with all due respect to all responsible) that it has been taken seriously enough. Time to take it a notch higher. Could it possibly be something that the Senate ICT Committee can take up and see it to its logical conclusion? I mean if the National Government is in such a rut when it comes to basic email communication can you imagine what is happening in the counties?
I think that should be enough to keep you busy on this issue. :-)
*Ali Hussein*
Digital Transformation
Tel: +254 713 601113
Twitter: @AliHKassim
Skype: abu-jomo
LinkedIn: http://ke.linkedin.com/in/alihkassim <http://ke.linkedin.com/in/alihkassim>
Any information of a personal nature expressed in this email are purely mine and do not necessarily reflect the official positions of the organizations that I work with.
On Sun, Jul 5, 2020 at 11:33 PM Abshiro Halake via kictanet < [email protected]> wrote:
Ali, Twahir, team,
Great idea to enlighten the government and its agencies on this. The ICT Ministry should actually take the lead. We could put a parliamentary question to the ICT Ministry as to why the government continues to use personal emails. That being said, I was once told that there are two reasons why this is the case - 1. that government jobs are so temporary especially for certain cadre of people and 2. tech maintenance and support is so bad. Not sure if these are just excuses but it may be worth it to still put the questions. Can someone send me a few pointers to include in the question/statement? Perhaps why it is important to change this and also reassurance on security etc.....
Thanks and kind regards,
Sen. Abshiro
