New e-Government project an ‘online one-stop shop’
A NEW “e-Government” project is set to take the weight off the state – and make life easier for the public – by moving services and data to an online one-stop shop.
The project, for which work began in 2016, will aim to increase service quality and save time by bringing public services together on a “common platform in an electronic environment”.
While some services are already available online, work is continuing to provide others too.
TRNC e-Government executive board chairman and Public Works and Transport Ministry undersecretary Dr Suat Yeldener explained that the “TRNC e-Government Programme” is being implemented in three phases.
Once the e-Government platform is operational, “uninterrupted public services will be offered safely to the public 24 hours a day, seven days a week, with a citizen-oriented approach” Dr Yeldener said.
“Thus, an integrated transformation process that brings different services or projects under one roof will be achieved,” he said.
“After the implementation of the e-Government project, the burden of state institutions and organisations will be eased.”
Under Phase One of the project, an “Electronic Document Management System” (EBYS) was set up in June 2016 under a protocol signed with Turkey, under which three million digital documents were created in four and half years.
“Transactions were made using thousands of pieces of paper that needed to be taken from one place to another and signed,” Dr Yeldener said, adding that inter-department “document flow” has been completely digitised.
“The implementation of EBYS has saved both paper and time, with correspondence sent by a computer in a second with a push of a button.”
The partial digitisation of government services has also seen 150,000 new style “eID cards” issued since 2017, which he said are more durable then the previously issued cards and “almost impossible” to forge.
Phase Two has seen the introduction of a pilot e-Customs system at Ercan airport to reduce red tape with “world-class modern automation” that is planned to be rolled out to all customs points, as well as a digital education hub and the digitisation of records relating to 200,000 buildings and 85,000 roads.
Dr Yeldener pointed out that Phase Three includes new large-scale projects like the “eHealth System”.
“Health data records will be created, citizens will be able to follow their own health information and have easy access to health services,” he said, adding that there are 16 eHealth “subsystems”.
The tender for the e-Health system has been finalised and the software will start to be created “soon”, Dr Yeldener said, becoming operational “in six months to one year at the latest”.
Phrase Three will also see the implementation of the “e-Government Gateway” system that will provide “citizen-state interaction for public services from a single point” in a “fast and secure manner”.
“Analysis, design, software development and test studies for the e-Government Gateway have been completed,” he said. “Training has concluded to a large extent and technical training is planned.”
He also confirmed that foundations of a new two-storey “data centre” are planned to be laid on Tuesday, July 20, as previously reported by this paper.
Dr Yeldener said that other digitisation projects are also planned, which he hopes will “bear the entire burden of providing services in a 100 per cent electronic environment”.