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By Ike Suarez, Correspondent
The Philippines desperately needs a stronger
government body established by law to oversee development of
information and communications technology (ICT) in the country.
This is the position the Commission on
Information and Communications Technology has taken in a paper
furnished by the Senate Committee on Science and Technology chaired
by Sen. Edgardo Angara in response to Senate Bill 920 sponsored by
Sen. Loren Legarda, creating the Department of Information and
Communications Technology.
The Commission on Information and Communications
Technology paper, a copy of which was obtained by The Manila Times,
rebutted arguments that a Department of Information and
Communications Technology would only add to the Philippine
bureaucracy and require additional appropriations for the yearly
national government budget.
The paper gave other reasons for the need
to establish the new department, namely:
1) There is need for a government agency to
focus on the new gap between haves-and-have-nots in society called
the Digital Divide defined by who in the country has access to the
benefits of access to ICT and who has not;
2) There is need for a stronger government body
to push e-government initiatives improving efficiency, transparency,
and accountability in the delivery of government services;
3) There is need for a government agency to
focus on initiatives to enable the Philippines to remain globally
competitive in e-services by developing new and higher value-added
services;
4) There is the need to effectively address the
issues of convergence by integrating the communications units of the
Department of Transportation and Communications with the Commission
on Information and Communications Technology;
5) The Commission on Information and
Communications Technology’s permanent existence, which was created
by Presidential Executive Order 454 in 2004, cannot be guaranteed;
this hinders it from fully carrying out its mandate to coordinate
and implement ICT programs;
6) Many other countries, including the
Philippines’ competitors in the global market for e-services
already have cabinet-level agencies or ministries that focus on
policies for the effective development of ICT in their respective
countries.
The paper pointed out that creation of the
Department of Information and Communications Technology would not
mean creation of an entirely new government body. Instead, the
Department of Information and Communications Technology would be
made up of the Commission on Information and Communications
Technology, National Computer Center, Telecommunications Office, and
other communications units of the Department of Transportation and
Communications.
“All of these units have their approved
budgets, so the creation of the DICT will simply result in the
reassignment of these budgets,” the paper said. It added that the
bringing together of these agencies would support the government’s
thrust to streamline the bureaucracy by providing a mechanism to
reengineer existing functions of government offices.
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