Ethiopia’s eGovernment is at another turning point. Envisioning a connected, user-centric, and data-driven government, Ethiopia is taking big steps toward the interoperability of e-government applications. The Ministry of Innovation and Technology is leading this exercise, while the international development consultant DT Global is implementing it as part of the National E-Government Strategy and Enterprise Architecture for 2024–2029.
The Interoperable Digital Government Initiative is aimed at bringing about ease of processes between different ministerial and regional offices by bringing them under one unified domain. As Lishan Adam, IT Consulting team lead at DT Global puts it, such interoperability would have the running of the government in a more efficient and cohesive way.
Learning from Global Best Practices
Countries like Brazil, UK, and Germany have dealt with the issue by drafting a Government Interoperability Framework, GIF. The policy and technical structure described by these frameworks will guide the development of e-government services to ensure a coherent flow of information across systems.
Consequently, inspired by these global best practices, Ethiopia is currently assessing existing directives, laws, and regulations. This assessment aims to ensure the effective implementation of digital government principles, including the digital-by-default principle. The concept means that every project implementation will have digital component support.
EU Delegation to Ethiopia Cooperation Head Roberto Schiliro stated that Ethiopia’s eGovernment initiative allows the government to provide efficient services. Noting that it is also an important step to develop a market-led economy based on open communication and transparency, he reiterated that the EU remains steadfast to support Ethiopia achieve its goal in digital transformation, improve business environment and investment climate.
Winding Road Ahead
However, the path to interoperability isn’t that straightforward. A review by UNDP of government interoperability frameworks in selected countries indicates that most of the time, e-government initiatives develop with specifications and solutions that match goals and tasks relevant to a particular agency but lack adequate attention to the surrounding government institutions and ICT systems.
This has resulted in a patchwork of ICT solutions that are not always compatible with each other, bringing about inefficiency and wastage of resources.
Ethiopia’s eGovernment: Build trust through better service
The ultimate goal of the Ethiopian digital governance strategy is to restore citizens’ trust in government services. Enhancing privacy and security, ensuring mobile accessibility, implementing cloud-based solutions, and increasing the availability of shared services will attain this.
The Ethiopia’s e-government strategy and enterprise architecture for 2024-2029, presented at a validation workshop on July 11th, 2024, sets the tone for Ethiopia’s radical digital transformation. It proposes four pillars of digital government and fourteen ambitious implementation areas that deal with the sprawling agenda pertaining to applications facing the citizens, data management, cybersecurity, and regional collaboration.
In short, Ethiopian Minister of Innovation and Technology Belete Molla stated that the new draft strategy builds upon the success and lessons of the ongoing strategy. He sees the new digital national e-government strategy as a transformative blueprint that will shape the government’s digital future. The development of the current strategy has prioritized continuous stakeholder involvement and input collection. Minister Molla said that the workshop signifies the final stage before submitting the strategy for the government’s approval.
Overall, the National E-government Strategy and Enterprise Architecture will be implemented for five years, from 2024 to 2029, with an eight-month trial period. With this strategy, the government will make 2,500 eServices available to citizens and businesses by the year 2030. For the management of planned government-wide applications and service delivery, the Ministry will establish a Digital Government Service Center.
