HAVE YOUR SAY IN PRESIDENT'S SONA REPLY

PRESIDENT Cyril Ramaphosa won’t only be responding to points raised by members of Parliament in his State of the Address (Sona) reply today, he will also be responding to comments and questions by ordinary South Africans.

This is all thanks to GovChat, the civic engagement platform which enables the government to send messages to the public and receive service delivery-related messaging in return at no cost.

GovChat allows South Africans to visit the website and leave their comments and responses, platform chief executive officer Eldrid Jordaan said.

“It was important to understand whether there was appetite to engage with the president and government,” he said. “It was important for us to understand that from a conversation point of view, the response has been phenomenal.”

Jordaan said there were hundreds of comments left by many young South Africans on the website, and these have been noted by the Presidency.

“I can confirm that they will be replying to citizens in the Sona reply,” he said. “Various conversations from citizens that have been put the GovChat platform. Many issues like the health-care system, public transport, and drought.”

The GovChat team was invited by African Union (AU) Commission to represent South Africa and the Government Communication and Information Service at the AU Information and Communications Technology Week in Abidjan, Côte d’Ivoire in 2016.

“It was a huge honour, just to be celebrated and to showcase Africa’s technology,” Jordaan said. “We got a standing ovations at that high level.”

IT WAS IMPORTANT TO UNDERSTAND WHETHER THERE WAS APPETITE TO ENGAGE