A WRITTEN REPORT IN E-GOVERNMENT:

ISSUES AND CHALLENGES

submitted by

BPA 4-2

Group 6

Bonsol, Mariah G.

Galang, Aica Denise Gerard C.

Martinez, Jerome

to

Prof. Roberto S. Rimorin

E-governance aims to have an inclusive governance that will deepen engagement between the government
and the people. In order to achieve this, the government aims to be more open an accountable to the people
by being more responsive and transparent through online services. However, in striving for efficiency, e-
governance are still facing challenges today.

I. Issues and Challenges in E-Governance

First, e-governance is being challenged by the lack of citizen engagement. Without the active participation
of the people, it cannot fulfil its purpose. This is due to the lack of awareness from the citizens. Many people
are still not aware of the online services provided by government agencies and local government units. In
some cases, there are even some local executives and officials who did not know that their own LGU has a
website. Aside from this, funding constraints also hinders the efficiency of e-governance. This causes
government agencies and local government units to have difficulty in maintaining their online websites.
These can happen in two different situations. It occurs wherein the government do not have the ability to
acquire ICT hardware and software due its expensiveness or high cost. It also occurs in a situation that even
if they have ICT hardware and software, they cannot maintain its efficiency. Another challenge faced by
the government is the bureaucratic culture. It is because of the lack of inclusive environment and structure
that supports e-governance initiatives wherein the management is unsupportive on the re-tooling the civil
service and transformation of the government workers into knowledge workers. Aside from the challenges
within government agencies and local government units, there are also issues encountered because of the
digital divide. It involves the issue on connectivity, accessibility and both computer and internet literacy.
It is because not all people have internet connection nor a stable one. Most people who have internet
connectivity belongs to the urban society while those in the rural areas have difficulty in using the internet.
This leads to the difficulty on the people who wants to access the website. However, aside from the technical
difficulties and error in the internet connection, low computer and internet literacy is the most contributing
factor that hinders the efficiency in e-governance. It is because with knowing how to use computer and the
internet, the people cannot access or use the online services given or provided by the government agencies
and local government units. This explains that the digital divide is the gap that is conditioned by traditional
social divisions of social divisions of class, income, education, gender, age, ethnicity and social geography.
It is related to another challenge which is generation gap. The old generation hinders them to access the
online websites of the government as they are unfamiliar in the usage of the computer and internet. But
when all these challenges are surpassed and addressed by the government, some challenges still arise like
the reluctance of government to provide information as they do not want their anomalies to be discovered
leaving this unchecked by the people. And lastly, the most prominent challenge in e-governance is
protecting the privacy and ensuring security of information. This does not only pertains to the information
of the people but also the government as well. This occurred when hackers were able to enter and interrupt
into the system until they steal information in the database.
 II. Recommendations
Public sector organizations are supposed to increase productivity by large-scale investments in our
Information Technology, thus introducing the importance of e-government. However, with the arising
issues and challenges faced by the field, maximum optimization of e-government cannot be fully utilized.
With this, our group proposed the following recommendations:

Our main theme is: WE-GOVERNMENT instead of E-GOVERNMENT

How can we achieve this?

1. Strategic Management approach and engage stakeholders

It's important to engage stakeholders, not just the people involved in the realms of information
technology. Here, we should integrate also internal employees at *all* levels, not just the top management.
Because the benefits of IT must be distributed to all, not just on our "boss". Moreover, if all employees,
from the top to bottom recognizes its importance and massive help it contributes, if there will come an issue
on IT, all would be involved, not just the top management. The principle we see here is equal benefits and
opportunities given, equal responsibility too.

Moreover, engagement must also be observed on all citizens, business and industries. E-government
covers all, not just the public sector employees, but also the transacting public and business as well. Hence,
the importance of integrating them should be considered seriously. Here we can have feedback forms as
well as communication centers where they can address the problems they have encountered while
transacting, and also gather suggestions from them.

And most importantly, it should be executed and monitored under the scrutiny of all stakeholders to
ensure accountability.

2. Conduct seminars and trainings that introduce the importance, productivity output and what they
can contribute to deliver the objectives of e-government.

Seminars and trainings must be inclusive, open to all who wants to gain more knowledge on the realm
of e-government and information technology. In the said activities, we must also make them appreciate and
understand the importance and benefits e-government has given us. Produce meaningful yet adaptive
presentation, provide statistics in other countries and locally on how e-government ease the transaction in
the public. Make them also reflect how can they contribute to deliver the objectives of e-government. At
the end of the day, they should feel both secured and empowered. Secured, that e-government is indeed a
great help to them and empowered, that they can do more with the help of it.
3. View e-government as a people issue rather than IT issue only.

As stated above, make people realize that e-government is inclusive, each of us can deliver something
important to the field. And that everyone will be benefited. However, such will remain an ideal if we will
not start making it into reality, if we continue being apathetic to what e-government can really do.

4. Introduce better security system, look for models in other countries.

In order to so this, we must invest on research. Our current system will not and will never progress if we
continue to use the old ways. It is a reality that we are far from behind on other countries' technology, but
such should not be seen as a hindrance, rather as a challenge for us to improve our ways and continuously
look for solutions.
 III. Case Study
E-government Initiatives of Four Philippine Cities

In the Philippines, a Government Information Systems Plan (GISP) was approved and adopted as
framework for all computerization efforts of key services and operations. This study used as case study
samples four city governments (Caloocan, Muntinlupa, Antipolo, and Tagaytay) known to actively use ICT
applications to determine: (1) the level of use of ICT, and (2) how their computerization efforts facilitate
good urban governance. This study show how these following cities apply e-governance in their City. For
example Information sought at the information desk vs. information on the city’s website Information that
are often sought at the city government’s information desk can generally be grouped into three: a) location
of offices b) processes of filing certain legal documents (applications for/renewal/clearances) and c)
availability of certain local government officials and staff, and the location of their offices. Next is the Job
vacancy information. In terms of ICT Equipment and Infrastructure they have WAN utilization it was used
primarily for service delivery and for connecting work stations of different offices one of the city that use
wan is the Caloocan City while in Antipolo City and Muntilupa City uses Intranet Utilization to monitor
and access data from the Permit and Licensing Office and the Assessor’s Office in Antipolo and to provide
their employees with access (to news, reports, information, and data), and to facilitate collaboration among
project teams in Muntinlupa city. They also use soft such as e governance, E-Commerce E-Services and E-
Administration. This initiative has been done by those 4 cities to promote e governance in their City. There
is also a study conducted in Naga, Samal, and Davao about their website that contain an online or poll,
where their respective citizens could directly voice out their views on specific issues. Polls in Samal and
Davao focused on local issues, namely, bridge construction and the most appropriate investment for the
city while in Naga they use polls to tackle national issues.