Government sourcing 150 million dollars for e-government project

Accra, July 3, GNA - The Government of Ghana is to secure additional 150 million dollars from the Chinese government to help complete the implementation of the e-government project.

Mr Haruna Iddrisu, Minister of Communications who announced this when touring e-government project sites in Accra on Friday, said both parties had almost reached the conclusion stage of the negotiations.

Mr Iddrisu, accompanied by his Deputy, Mr Gideon Quarcoo, toured sites including Burma Camp and Police Headquarters where telecommunication masts were being constructed to enhance communication among the country's security agencies.

When granted, this would bring to a total of 180 million dollar concessionary loan facility from the Chinese government to finance the project, having already granted 30 million dollars in 2008.

The e-government project is to extend the national backbone infrastructure to all districts in the country and provide a national data centre and a secondary data centre facility for disaster recovery capability.

It is also to connect all public institutions and Ministries, Departments and Agencies (MDAs) and Municipal, Metropolitan and District and Assemblies (MMDAs) to a single shared communications and computing infrastructure to facilitate the effective delivery of government services to citizens and businesses amongst others.

Mr Iddrisu expressed satisfaction at the progress of work so far and urged contractors to continue to work hard to meet the deadline.

He thanked the World Bank and the Chinese government for supporting the project.

Dr Sam Somuah, Director General of National Information Technology Agency (NITA), who conducted the Minister round the project sites, gave the assurance that construction of masts would end in the early part of next year to pave way for the commencement of the e-government project.

GNA