THE basic policy directions behind the restructuring of the functioning of IT within Government arises out of the Presidential Review Commission (PRC) appointed by former President Nelson Mandela whose findings were endorsed by his successor, President Thabo Mbeki for implementation.
A key element and recommendation of the PRC is co-ordination and consolidation of Government's IT initiatives.
Taking cue from the PRC report, the consolidation of the IT arms of the Department of Defense, SAPS IT and along with the Department of State Expenditures' Chief Directorate, the Central Computer Services, resulted in the formation of the State Information Technology Agency (SITA) on April 1 1999.
Similarly, the formal inauguration of arivia.kom on January 8 this year (2001), arising out of the merger of the IT arms of Eskom, Transnet and Denel, should be seen to be in line with the consolidation effort of State Owned Enterprises.
The establishment of arivia.kom's in January this year came after rigorous evaluation and approval by Cabinet.
At Ministerial level, the consolidation efforts that have manifested in the two state owned IT entities enjoy the shared understanding of both the Departments of Public Service and Administration, headed by Geraldine Fraser-Moleketi and Public Enterprises, headed by Jeff Radebe.
Encouraged by the breakthroughs registered SITA, Cabinet went further to give approval to Sita transform itself in order to:
* Refocus its business to perform Information Technology (IT) planning and advice;
* Leveraging economies of scale through the value adding acquisition of IT goods and services in order to reduce Government's expenditure on IT;
* Setting Standards and quality assurance on security and inter-operability to ensure that Government systems do communicate;
* Promoting use of IT to improve service delivery (e-Government) and;
* Provision of transversal IT services, that is, services to more than one Government department.
Guided by the theme for consolidation and co-ordination, with a view to integrate Government IT initiatives, MD of SITA, Colin van Schalkwyk, and arivia.kom CEO, Zeth Malele have already entered into discussions to make their respective entities conform to the greater picture of the country's consolidation effort.
That said, we as chairpersons, do not share industry fears to the effect that SITA and arivia.kom may act at cross-purposes to each other.
And as soon as the terms of co-operation between the entities have been finalized, in terms of carrying out their complementary roles, a briefing will be done to all stakeholders.
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