MANAMA: As part of GCC joint initiatives that aim at enhancing technical cooperation, reinforcing channels of cooperation and fostering joint action between the GCC states in the area of eGovernment, Bahrain participated with a delegation at the joint meeting between the Executive Committee for eGovernment and Committee for Undersecretaries of Post and Telecommunications and Information Technology along with the 13th meeting of the Executive Committee for eGovernment in the GCC.
The Bahraini delegation went under the chairmanship of eGovernment Authority CEO Mr. Mohammed Ali Al Qaed and included Vice CEO of eGovernment Authority Dr. Zakareya Ahmed Al-Khajah, Strategy eBusiness and Process Re-engineering Director of eGovernment Authority Nezar Maroof, as well as Telecommunications Regulatory Authority Market and Competition Manager Adel Darwish.
Held in Kuwait on March 9th and 10th, the meetings were chaired by Kuwait’s Central Agency for Information Technology Director General Abdullateef Suraie Al-Suraie who welcomed the participants, reviewed the agenda of both meetings and reaffirmed that these meetings are held to enhance the technical cooperation and joint action between the GCC states in eGovernment.
Additionally, they support the exchange of expertise in this field- contributing in refining and developing the level of eGovernment services in the GCC countries.
The first meeting, held on Sunday March 9th, addressed in details the overlapping of work by the Executive Committee for eGovernment and Committee for Undersecretaries of Post and Telecommunications and Information Technology. It also clearly defined the mandates of the two committees and coordination about the shared issues, based on a joint decision taken by the Ministerial Committee for the eGovernment and the Ministerial Committee in charge of Post, Telecommunications and Information Technology at the Secretariat-General of the Cabinet.
The second meeting, 13th Meeting of the GCC Executive Committee for eGovernment, addressed a wide range of significant issues in relation to the coordination of the eGovernment activities in the GCC council. The delegates addressed the report and recommendations of the technical team entrusted with developing a mechanism to implement the joint initiatives for the eGovernment’s pilot strategy endorsed by their majesties and highnesses during the summit held last December in Kuwait.
The meeting also reviewed details of the GCC joint initiatives in eGovernment for the year 2014 and the division of leading roles among the GCC countries in order to implement such initiatives which will be evaluated based on periodically reports.
The Committee recommended the 4th GCC eGovernment Award, Conference and Exhibition be organized in the Kingdom of Bahrain next year and referred recommendations of the member states pertaining to ways of improving the award for the next meeting of the committee, along with the final recommendations and report on GCC eGovernment Award and Conference held in December last year in UAE.
The Committee listened to a demonstration by the State of Kuwait focused on the IT governance model that has recently been implemented by Kuwait and recommended the exchange of experiences and lessons learned from Kuwait’s experience. The Kingdom of Saudi Arabia also presented a standard study on GCC official web portals, based on international best practices. The study is anticipated to be completed before the end of this year and then shared with the rest of the GCC states.
Furthermore, the meeting discussed the developments of linking the GCC eGovernment electronic portal which was proposed as a pivot to exchange services and information among the member states according to the approved technical criteria and standards in this domain.
The Committee endorsed the agenda for the meeting of the Ministerial Committee for eGovernment which will be held on March 23rd in Kuwait.