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Lootah said that this competition was meant to highlight the efforts of Arab governments that have established websites both to provide services to citizens and residents and to provide information and transparency based on the technology used by global e-governments.
"The Award is like a tool for creating websites that provide government information and services online effectively and at any time and any place," he said.
"E-technology is not just the use of technology, but they are the results provided by the country and official establishments to the Arab citizens through the use of ICT to improve the transparency, efficiency and effectiveness of public establishments, which are currently facing daily challenges in the developing world, so their websites should be easy to navigate as audience is the internet users from the general public,"
said Lootah.
"It should be noted that the e-government gateways save huge amount of time and money in some cases it removes the problem of days of waiting for the users for the required documents. The purpose of creating a website for the government is to provide citizens with a clear idea of the government's procedures and the work on the one hand, and the provision of services and enhancing the image of the country and its bodies related to the end user on the other hand," he said.
Abdul Hakim Malik, Director of Information Technology Department in Dubai Municipality said this award promotes e-government sites, encourages creativity in their design, honours the best websites designed according to international standards of e-government websites, finds out and promotes creative spirit and creative minds working in the e-government, to find the best e-government sites that continue to improve the quality of its services so that the Arab citizens can benefit from their services.
"The award appreciates and recognizes the efforts of Arab governments and official establishments, which have established websites to provide services to citizens and residents on its territory as well as encourages the creation of more e-government sites in the Arab world so that people in the region get benefited from the global technological revolution by the administrative and sustainable development services in the Arab countries," he said.
"For Dubai Municipality this award comes in recognition of its continuing efforts in e-transformation process in Dubai, which began in 2000 and its keenness to maintain a leading position always," Malik said.
"Dubai Municipality had converted 100% of its services to electronic by the end of 2008 to become the first government department to achieve the vision of His Highness Sheikh Mohammed Bin Rashid Al Maktoum. Today, it offers 490 online services to its customers and the entire society and monthly it accomplishes 200 e-transactions. The number of e-transactions conducted through the Dubai Municipality portal so far is 6,400,000, and the income by e-payment is amounted to Dhs33m per month," he said.
"We are proud of our accomplishment rate of 99% e-transactions, overtaking the ratio achieved in the best e-government in the world such as Canada, America and Singapore. This has led to transforming to the concept of a paperless Municipality that does not need real time visits, which is the basis and essence of e-government," said Malik.
"We provide on the Municipality website various e-services that support and help a variety of business sectors in the emirate, most importantly, engineering and planning sectors that are well known to grow rapidly and they contribute the major share in the development and prosperity of Dubai. The Municipality has a major role in accelerating the transactions of developers, consultants and contractors electronically without the trouble of waiting a long time. There are a number of electronic services in engineering and planning sectors as 50,920 users have enrolled for our e-services," he said.
"The main sectors which contributed to the development of Municipality e-services were the environment and public health services sectors as the Municipality have provided e-services in the areas of granting health certificates, clinic services and waste collection and treatment that benefits 40,299 subscribers. The e-services have contributed in streamlining procedures and reducing the time required to accomplish transactions, which reflected positively on the quality of life in Dubai," said Malik.
"Another important sector, which contributed to the development of e-services, is the environment, health and safety monitoring sector in the control of food establishments and industries, and laboratory and environmental testing. Issuing of certificates and permits are done smoothly electronically and with high quality without the need for the customer to come physically to the office and there are 39,204 people registered to avail the services in this sector," he said.
"A number of e-services are offered for hotels and cinemas, which contributed to accelerating the growth of tourism sector. There are a large number of enterprises and individuals enrolled for these services and their number has grown to 9,654," said Malik.
Posted by Rana Mesbah
