[Kictanet] Just Sh783 million for the Infocom Ministry?

[Emmanuel Njenga]

Hello all Kenyans,

I just noted with concern that the Infocom Ministry was allocated only 
sh783 million (about $ 9.8 USD) for the 2005/2006 budget making it 
amongst the lowest allocation to a ministry in Kenya..see more details 
here..

http://www.nationmedia.com/dailynation/nmgcontententry.asp?category_id=1&newsid=51127

...I wonder how much this goes given the plans to implement the ICT 
policy.....

I would like to believe that other ministries that have been allocated 
generous amounts (education, Health, OP and so forth) have plans to use 
the $$ on ICT related projects and thus compensate for the low amounts 
to the InfoCom ministry.

And just highlight some interesting facts here - at a meeting in April 
this year in Addis Ababa, a comparison was made on how ICT allocations 
featured in several African countries with the following results..

the budget for 2005 allocated to institutions (or ministries) in charge 
of ICTs  as percentage of total budget: 0.28% in South Africa, 1.89% in 
Mauritius, 1.27% in Botswana, 0.07% in Ghana and 1.47% in the case of 
Lesotho, so if we add Kenya here we would get 0.15 as % of the national 
budget.

So really the question here  is - what amounts will go to ICT spending 
from other ministries or does this mean we are stuck with only 0.15% 
(wonder how much of this is goes to salaries and/or other admin?) for 
the 05/06 year..is this the amount to look forward to implement the 
national ICT policy?

Or are we going to rely/seek donor/private sector funds to implement the 
national ICT policy or what avenues exist to move forward with the plan 
once finalised...?

I would to link this to the WSIS process that has spent a considerable 
time talking about financing for ICT development ...and we should looks 
at some of the reports to pick on some of the recommendations on 
financing ICT for developments. Here are two relevant reports..

* A New Policy Framework for ICTD
A new ICTD policy could provide the overall policy guidelines that would 
need to be enacted by national governments in suitable policy and 
legislation as well as their MDG-based poverty reduction strategy and 
budget.
http://africa.rights.apc.org/index.shtml?apc=re_1&x=30872

Task Force on Financial Mechanisms -final report
http://www.itu.int/wsis/tffm/final-report.pdf

Regards,

Njenga



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Emmanuel Njenga Njuguna
Africa Policy Monitor Project
Association for Progressive Communications (APC)
Email: africa.rights at apc.org or njenga at apc.org
Web: http://africa.rights.apc.org
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