Ten years after BahamasB2B founders gave a presentation in Freeport on e-Government in The Bahamas, it appears that Bahamian politicians are finally listening.
The Government of the Bahamas is promising to launch an e-government initiative that will “humongously” impact the ease of doing business in the Bahamas, said Zhivargo Laing, Minister of State for Finance.
The original push for e-Government in the Bahamas occurred in 2001 when BahamasB2B founders went to Freeport to give a presentation as part of a special committee of the Bahamas Financial Services Board.
The committee gave its recommendations to the government at that time, but the proposals were shelved when the PLP government took power in 2002.
The new initiative was developed in consultation with the Singapore government.
Parliamentarians will be given a presentation on the e-government on November 8, and the Government expects to implement the programme over the next “nine to 12 months,” Mr Laing said.
The initiative promises to make many government services attainable via the Internet.
“This will be huge for us. It’s very significant,” said Mr Laing, who added that the Government will shortly be launching a “massive” public awareness campaign on the programme.
The Government paid $700,000 to consultants in Singapore to develop the Bahamas’ own e-government initiative based on the successful Singaporean model.
“We have a number of services we have decided will be launched first. It’s not possible to do it all at once. It’s not just putting things on the Internet. You have to have all the back office operations set up,” Laing said at the Exuma Business Outlook seminar at the Sandals Emerald Bay Resort.
