With a viral increase in the need of
technology in East Africa we expect our government tom invest more and to
support the ICT projects in the region. Currently our governments are not doing
so in their budgets plan living the industry to survive by its own ways. The
numbers of ICT projects in East Africa have increased exponentially with some
funds from outside and lot of startup programs at least the industry is moving
but still the government support is the main weapon in this battle against
factors hindering technology enhancement in Africa.
Currently East African companies are
earning a lot of money from technology industries while the mobile phone
companies and ICT related companies being among the major contributors of the
income of the nations but still the amount of money spent by these governments
to the technology sector is not sufficient.
Tanzanian
Finance Minister William Mgimwa announced a $2.5 million allocation to
strengthen ICT "so as to improve access to various services including
information, access to domestic and external market, revenue collection, health
services, education, financial services, etc.” The breakdown of the budget
still left very small amount of money which will specifically touch the
required sector of the ICT industry which is supporting research projects and
funding startup programs.
Uganda's allocated US$4.8 million for
the ICT sector this is the lowest in the past three years, according to an
analysis by the Collaboration on International ICT Policy for East and Southern
Africa (CIPESA). The budget blueprints were reviewed by finance ministers on
June 15. Looking at the Uganda allocation, the funding amounts to only 0.13
percent of projected government expenditures over the next 12 months. Uganda
had spent $7.1 million last year and $5.7 million the year before that.
Meanwhile the Rwanda government, taking notable strides in promoting ICT
infrastructure investments and enabling usage by citizens in recent years, did
not specifically provide for ICT spending for the next 12 months, and no
explanation was given.
John Rwangombwa, Rwanda's finance minister, said in the next
12 months, the government will help enhance operations of the Carnegie Mellon
University in the country and the Kigali Techno Pole tech area to boost ICT for
private sector development. Speaking in parliament on June 15, Rwangombwa
reported completion of work on a number of investments in the past few years,
including the national fiber-optic cable backbone, a wireless broadband system
for the capital Kigali, a national data center and an embassy intranet.
Kenya being the fastest growing IT hub for East Africa with a lot of ICT
activities and projects going on especially in the capital Nairobi the
government still was reluctant in touching the Industry directly through
providing money to the stakeholders in the startup programs and research
projects instead funding it indirectly. The Kenyan government has removed the
importation duties to all computer related commodities as an effort to support
the industry. Kenyan Finance Minister
Robinson Njeru Githae did not say a lot in his budget speech as far as the ICT
sector goes but allocated some $5.6 million for the purchase of computers for
schools.
In
the future we expect our leaders and decision makers to invest more in
technology since the industry is booming with a lot of graduate and ICT
professionals in the street we need more chances to be created in the ICT
sector to combat the critical lack of jobs situation in our communities. By
funding local ICT entrepreneur the governments will reduce the burden facing
them of providing job opportunities to the fresher in the job market and give them
opportunities to attain more income from the ICT sectors.