Delivery Session of ‘e-Government Master Plan for Digital Bangladesh’

With the Co-operation of the Korea International Cooperation Agency (KOICA) under the project “Formation of e-Government Master Plan for Digital Bangladesh” implemented by Bangladesh Computer Council of Information and Communication Technology Division, the final e-Government Master Plan draft report delivery program was held at BCC auditorium  Thursday on 25 October 2018 at 10:30 am.

Mr. Zunaid Ahmed Palak MP. Honourable State Minister for Information and Communication Technology Division was present as the Chief Guest, Mr. Joe Hyun-Gue, Hon’ble Country Director, KOICA Bangladesh Office was present as the Guest of Honour in the program. The program was presided over by Ms. Zuena Aziz, Honorable Secretary, Information and Communication Technology Division.

Mr. Parthapratim Dev, Executive Director, Bangladesh Computer Council and “Formation of the e-Government Master Plan for Digital Bangladesh” Project Director Mr. Mohammad Manir Hossain along with invited guest from different Ministry, Division, Organization, ICT Industries & Academia were also present in the occasion.

Project Director of “e-Government Master Plan for Digital Bangladesh” Mr. Mohammad Manir Hossain has delivered welcome speech. In his speech he has mentioned about the back-ground, objectives, components and development of the e-Gov. Master Plan report.

Hon’ble State Minister Mr. Zunaid Ahmed Palak said, I would like to offer my sincere appreciation to all of you for being with us since we started our journey to transform the country into a knowledge-based and technology-driven one, to be branded as Digital Bangladesh by 2021. In the last 10 years. We worked relentlessly to lead the country to a development path which the nation never saw before. Today, I am sure all of you would agree that the essence and glory of ‘Digital Bangladesh’ is real. Thanks to our visionary leader Hon’ble Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina for giving the nation the great, innovative ‘Vision 2021’. Also thanks to our Hon’ble ICT Affairs Adviser to Hon’ble Prime Minister, Mr. Sajeeb Wazed to direct us to the realistic path of development of digital transformation.

He also addresses that I have learnt that the formulation of Master plan involves a number of stages. The main objectives of this master plan are to prioritize the needs of the citizen more than anything and find out the best to provide the services to the people. Because the goal of our Government is to digitalize government services, but the real goal is to provide benefits to citizens with the services and make the citizens’ lives and interactions with the government easier, efficient and more simplified.

Mr. Joe Hyun-Gue, Country Director, KOICA Bangladesh Office has said in his speech, that Bangladesh Govt. initiated to launch a project on “Establishment of the e-Government Master Plan for Digital Bangladesh”  in collaboration with ICT Division. He appreciate BCC, ICTD for arranging such event that aims to build a blueprint to materialize the pillars of Digitals Bangladesh which are:

• Skilled Human Resources,
• High speed Internet Connectivity,
• e-Governance & Promotion of ICT Industry.

He also said in his speech that  e-Government Master plan project also aligned with the SDG target 9.C which is “Significantly increase access to information and communications technology and strive to provide universal and affordable access to the Internet”. I firmly believe that Bangladesh would achieve this goal by maintaining the same progress.

In the closing speech, the Chairperson  Mr. Zuena Aziz, Hon’ble Secretary, ICT Division said, First of all, I want to thank the Honorable State Minister for his kind presence and especially thanks to KOICA Bangladesh’s Country Director and his team, for their continuous support for the implementation of ‘e-Government Master Plan for Digital Bangladesh’ project. Today’s presentation, I have noticed that according to the report of UN e-Government Survey 2018, Denmark ranked 1st, Australia ranked 2nd, Republic of Korea ranked 3rd and Bangladesh ranked 115th among 193 countries. In the subcontinent ranking we are 3^rd position but still we have to go a long way to achieve the target of ranking below 100th position by 2021.

Currently there is no dedicated law for our e-governance related activities. We need such law to implement the e-Government related project.