Digitalizing Local Government Services

Pilot E-governance Platform for Local Governments in Somaliland in an Effort to Digitalize Municipal Functions and Services

The UN Joint Programme on Local Governance and Decentralized Service Delivery in Somaliland (UN JPLG) is a five-year joint programme comprising of ILO, UNCDF, UNDP, UN-HABITAT and UNICEF. The Programme’s overall goal is “creating an enabling environment for improved service delivery and greater stability, through improved legal, policy and system frameworks – building the knowledge of those working in and with local governments.” JPLG commenced in April 2008 and has now entered its third phase (2018- 2023).

From the government front, in 2018, the Ministry of Information and Communication Technology (MoICT) carried out government e-readiness assessment covering 43 public institutions.

The survey revealed that 98% of surveyed government institutions believe that internet is crucial for their work, as it is both reliable and connects efficiently to the public.

To capitalize the potential of the ICT in government, the Ministry is committed to digitize public service delivery and thus, introduced e-governance strategy 2020-2024. The strategy entails transforming public service delivery process from traditional way of doing it to a more efficient, faster and paperless systems guided by ICT.

The strategy also outlines phased action plan to digitize selected public services, of which many of them fall within the domain of local governments. These include, but not limited to marriage, death, divorce, birth, land registry, health, education, police, taxes.

Within the framework of JPLG, MoICT in partnership with UN-Habitat aims to advance e-government to local government levels – the level that’s closest to the communities, and to build on earlier success in automating tax administration systems. This will also capitalize the existing ICT infrastructure, expertise and various legal and regulatory frameworks introduced by MoICT. This support significantly transforms public service delivery of the local government and makes their services’ modern and tech oriented.
 

The overall objective of this exercise is to modernize priority services of the local governments in Somaliland to deliver services equitably and efficiently. This exercise is also meant to enhance transparency and accountability within the service delivery process and foster confidence and trust between the public and the local governments. on top of delivering services more efficiently, the move will further strengthen own source revenue generation at the district level.  

• Digitalizing local government services
• Expanding local government services.
• Increase access, transparency, and citizen empowerment
• Increase Revenue
• Easy payment processing