Recommendations and proposals for action

Core government functions and digital solutions

- Use the Integrated Management Information System of Territory Administration (SIIGAT) to collect performance indicators on public policy implementation at the local level.

- Establish measurable results and objectives to support the implementation of digital government policies and programmes, as part of the new state reform strategy (under preparation).

- Keep the biometric database of civil servants updated ("proof of life"), namely by considering taking advantage of the new identity card features (microchip).

Institutional foundations for a sound digital government ecosystem

- Establish guidance for engaging an ecosystem of public, private and civil society actors in the design, implementation and monitoring of digital government policies.

- Develop a monitoring and impact assessment framework for digital government and use that framework to guide the interactive development of digital government.

- Strengthen the relevance and regularity of meetings of the Council for Information Technologies (Conselho para as Tecnologias da Informação) to better support implementation of the updated National Plan for the Information Society. Promote knowledge sharing and synergies among public stakeholders.

- Secure dedicated resources through the national budget, to be managed by INFOSI – National Institute for the Promotion of the Information Society (Instituto Nacional de Fomento da Sociedade da Informação), to co-finance projects across sectors and levels of government in order to better promote a coherent digital government.

- Establish policy levers, co-ordinated by INFOSI, to optimise public IT expenditure (e.g. avoiding the dispersion of databases and servers) though, for example, the mandatory evaluation of digital technologies investments above a certain threshold. The adopting of business cases and project management for public sector projects should support this policy.

- Create a professional information and communication technology (ICT) career in public administration. Improve and harmonise the remuneration of ICT professionals to retain ICT skills in public administration.

- Establish national digital skills training programmes, including for delivery in rural areas, to improve digital literacy, reduce the digital divide and improve citizen access to digital public services.

Citizen-driven approaches for a sustainable and coherent digital service

- Establish and implement protocols to share data between government agencies and public services, and to store it in the public data centre managed by INFOSI.

- Accelerate the development of an interoperability platform based on the government’s private network (Rede Privativa do Estado) to promote the mutual exchange and use of data among public agencies.

- Define a public digital identity framework based on the recently launched new Identity document (Bilhete de Identidade).

- Improve co-operation between the network of physical one-stop-shops SIAC (Sistema Integrado de Atendimento ao Cidadão) and the Citizen’s Portal (Portal do Cidadão).

- Expand and improve the Unique Business Counter (Guichet Único da Empresa) to facilitate and promote entrepreneurial activities in the country.

- Facilitate the installation of mobile spaces equipped with public access computers and free technologies in rural areas (project Andando com as TIC) and accelerate the delivery and use of digital technologies in schools (project Meu Kamba).

Core government functions and digital solutions

- Take the necessary steps to consolidate the information provided by the Municipal Information System (SIM) on the municipal budgets, within the government national accounts.

- Accelerate the development of an e-procurement platform in line with the public procurement law.

- Develop applications and systems to archive, disseminate and grant access to statistical products and indicators by citizens and companies, on an open and free basis.

- Take all measures to create an automatic voting registration system (potentially conductive to an electronic voting system).

Institutional foundations for a sound digital government ecosystem

- Engage the private sector, academia and civil society in the completion or implementation of the new digital government strategy.

- Consider the integration of new technological trends (cloud computing, blockchain etc.) and digital government paradigms (digital by design, open by default, government as a platform) to secure a shift from e-government to digital government approaches.

- Continue the development of the Integrated Government Resources Planning (IGRP) as an important shared tool that allows better communication. Share information from different government information systems.

- Reinforce the role of the interministerial body with co-ordination responsibilities to synchronise actions, projects and possible synergies on digital government.

- Clarify the role of the Operational Unit for the Information Society (NOSI) (Núcleo Operacional da Sociedade de Informação) in the governance framework.

- Consider the development of a digital skills training programme for government officials focused on the promotion of user, professional and complementary competencies.

- Harmonise the remuneration of ICT professionals across the public sector in order to mitigate potential brain-drain.

Citizen-driven approaches for a sustainable and coherent digital service

- Rationalise the number of public sector portals providing services to citizens and businesses, and increase efforts to concentrate services in the Porton di nos Ilha portal.

- Reinforce efforts to map service delivery processes in the entire public administration to proceed with simplification and digitalisation efforts.

- Adopt digital authentication and digital signatures in citizen and business services through the use of the recently launched National Identification Card (Cartão Nacional de Identificação).

- Expand and scale up the use of mobile technologies for public service delivery across sectors and levels of government to simplify and improve the convenience of the interactions between citizens, businesses and the public sector.

- Reinforce NOSI’s responsibility to design and implement an open government data and open source software initiative in order to promote the transparency of government activities and reinforce citizen trust, better enable public-private value co-creation, and strengthen the competitiveness of national digital technology companies.

- Create a resource centre/online platform to provide remote learning tools for municipal officials (manuals of procedures, laws and forums).

- Establish and implement protocols for the mutual exchange and use of data among government agencies.

Core government functions and digital solutions

- Take the necessary steps to support the effective functioning of the Automated System for Customs Data (ASYCUDA ++) and the Integrated Public Financial Management System (SIGFIP). Connect these systems to the central treasury to secure and safeguard the government’s revenue pipeline and enable coherent financial forecasting.

- Digitise the public service registry to stabilise the payroll and ensure government oversight and management of its human resources. Prioritise the rationalisation of security service personnel (police and military), teachers and health professionals.

- Continue the development of the Integrated Human Resources Management System of the Public Administration (SIGHRAP) with a view to creating a government database to enable single payroll management.

- Take the necessary measures to create a decentralised communication network between public administration services.

Institutional foundations for a sound digital government ecosystem

- Develop a digital government strategy as a means to define common goals and streamline priorities for the digitalisation of the public sector of Guinea-Bissau. Engage the digital government ecosystem of stakeholders in this process to ensure co-ownership and co-responsibility.

- Reinforce and clarify the leadership and co-ordination role of the Centre for the Technological Valorisation and Electronic Governance (Centro de Valorização Tecnológica e Governação Electrónica, CEVATEGE) and consider prospects to secure a pipeline of human and financial resources to support its functioning.

- Establish guidelines for the pre-evaluation of digital technology investments above a certain threshold, under the leadership of CEVATEGE.

- Consider the creation of a digital government steering committee, bringing together the senior officials that co-ordinate ICT policy in several sectors of government. Chaired by CEVATEGE, the committee should be responsible for overseeing the implementation of the new digital government strategy and securing the co-ordination of efforts across the public administration of Guinea Bissau.

Citizen-driven approaches for a sustainable and coherent digital service

- Digitalise the civil registry as a first step towards the development of a digital identity framework that can allow the country to leapfrog several stages of digital government development.

- Prioritise the short-term development of an integrated portal with information about public services available across the public administration.

- Prioritise the development of innovative e-Education and e-Health solutions in partnership with donors and non-governmental organisations (NGOs).

- Establish a network of spaces of assisted access to digital services in order to guarantee the delivery of public services to segments of the population less familiar with the use of digital tools.

- Establish national digital skills development programmes with a view to enabling implementation in rural areas to improve digital literacy, reduce the digital divide and promote access to and use of digital public services.

Core government functions and digital solutions

- Continue prioritising the establishment of a link between district budgets and plans and the e-SISTAFE terminal to strengthen decentralised public finance management.

- Continue to develop a human resources management system that integrates information on the entire life cycle of public administration employees.

- Support the initiatives of the National Institute of Statistics in the development of applications and systems to archive, disseminate and grant access to statistical products and indicators by the government, citizens and companies, including the production of vital statistics.

- Consider the creation of centralised vital statistics database at the Ministry of Justice.

Institutional foundations for a sound digital government ecosystem

- Adopt a standard, safe and secure government e-mail solution for all government officials.

- Secure the active engagement of the ecosystem of stakeholders in the development, implementation and monitoring of digital government initiatives and projects.

- Develop a monitoring methodology to measure the outputs, outcomes and impacts of the new Information Society Policy (2018).

- Designate the National Institute of Electronic Government (INAGE) (Instituto Nacional do Governo Electrónico) the responsibility to develop and implement technical standards and guidelines for application in the development of public IT systems.

- Identify and implement policy levers that can enable INAGE to develop coherent and sustainable digital government, including, for example, co-funding mechanisms, the co-ordination of public ICT procurement policy, and the pre-evaluation of digital technology investments through standardised business cases.

- Launch the new Information Society Policy to drive digital government development in the country.

Citizen-driven approaches for a sustainable and coherent digital service

- Prioritise implementation of the interoperability project to enable mutual exchange and use of data among public sector institutions.

- Digitise the civil register as a key requisite for developing a digital identity framework that can support relationships between citizens and businesses and the public sector.

- Enhance the use of the public data centre, namely the Maluana data centre, by different sectors, levels and institutions of government.

- Secure a multichannel policy for service delivery that enables the government to respond to user preferences and demands in a way that is tailored to different levels of digital user skills.

- Implement a one-stop-shop policy for face-to-face and digital service delivery that gives citizens and businesses integrated access to services provided by several institutions. Examples such as the e-Bau and the Mozambique Community Network (MCNET) could be considered as a reference.

- Set-up a network of spaces for assisted access to digital services to enhance the delivery of public services for citizens and business less familiar with the use of digital tools.

Core government functions and digital solutions

- Finalise the creation of a government private network that can connect public sector institutions and provide shared digital services.

- Subject to the availability of additional resources, establish a communication platform for the public sector in order to create the foundations for a unified joint digital document management system (case management system) for the public administration.

- Create a human resources management system for the public administration, namely to automate the process of authorising the payment of salaries.

Institutional foundations for a sound digital government ecosystem

- Adopt a standardised, safe and secure government e-mail network for all governmental officials.

- Adopt procedures for the pre-evaluation of public digital technologies investments above a certain threshold.

- Establish guidance to engage an ecosystem of public, private and civil society stakeholders in the design, implementation and monitoring of digital government policies.

- Reinforce the mandate and responsibilities of the Institute of Innovation and Knowledge (INIC, Instituto de Inovacão e Conhecimento) to lead and co-ordinate the digital government policy in the country. Allocate the proper human and financial resources.

- Establish a career path for ICT professionals within the public sector and develop ICT skills training programmes for government officials that are focused on the promotion of user, professional and complementary competencies.

Citizen-driven approaches for a sustainable and coherent digital service

- Complete digitalisation of the civil register to better manage citizen data and improve citizen access and interactions with the public sector.

- Digitise population registry, real-estate information (land cadastre and registration of ownership), business registry, vehicle registry, identification of physical and legal persons, and establish mechanisms to ensure the security and integrity of these records.

- Adopt functional interoperability standards and work processes for digital registries to ensure the availability, integrity and security of stored data.

- Create a digital one stop shop for the delivery of services to citizens and companies (e.g. Porton de nos Ilha in Cabo Verde).

- Engage the private sector in the provision of technical solutions to facilitate digital public services delivery (e.g. e-payment of taxes and fees).

- Set-up a network of spaces for assisted access to digital services to enhance the delivery of public services for citizens and business less familiar with the use of digital tools.

Core government functions and digital solutions

- Upgrade the operability of Freebalance across government.

- Update and cross-reference data between tax administration, social security, public service and civil registries.

- Support the mission of the Directorate-General Statistics and Directorate-General Policy & Research within the Ministry of Finance to collect data with the objective of later developing applications and systems to archive, disseminate and grant access to statistical products and indicators for government, citizens and companies.

- Develop standard e-mail solutions for all governmental officials
and a secure and back-up mailing system for officials.

Institutional foundations for a sound digital government ecosystem

- Clarify the different roles of TIC Timor, the National Directorate of ICT (Ministry of Development and Administrative Reform) and the Authority for the Regulation of Communications (Autoridade Reguladora das Comunicações), and agree on mechanisms to promote shared information and communication exchange and co-ordination.

- Implement the National Policy for ICT 2017-2019, namely the digital government component, and establish measures to monitor and assess the impact of the digital government policy and programmes.

- Establish guidance to engage public, private and civil society actors in the design, implementation and monitoring of digital government policies.

- Create a professional ICT cadre and career within the public administration to support the recruitment and retention of ICT skills within government.

- Develop ICT skills training programmes for delivery at the national level, as well as in rural areas, to improve digital literacy and reduce the digital divide.

Citizen-driven approaches for a sustainable and coherent digital service

- Establish the interoperability of inter-government ICT systems to cross-reference data between civil registries, the tax administration and the social security system. Develop an interoperability framework based on good practice experience in these areas.

- Consider prioritising a multichannel and one stop shop policy for service delivery, enabling the government to respond to citizen and business preferences and different levels of digital user skills when accessing public services.

- Develop training programmes to improve citizens’ digital skills, to be implemented through the use of free-internet zones, especially in the rural areas, in partnership with donors, businesses, foundations and NGOs.

- Expand and replicate digital services delivery innovations beyond pilot districts (for example, Liga Inan, mobile health services, and Hamutuk, nutrition projects).

- Foster the use audio-visual tools in schools, especially in rural areas, and create online libraries. Extend the training programmes on digital skills at the national level, especially in the rural areas, in order to improve digital literacy and reduce the digital divide.