General Introduction
Governments have been striving since the late 1990’s to find better ways to connect with their constituents via the Web. By putting government information online, and making it easily accessible, understandable, and usable, people can now interact with their government in ways never before imagined. This concept is dubbed “electronic government”, or eGovernment. (Robinson, David,Yu, Harlan, Zeller, Felten, William, 2008). Unfortunately, effective e-Government has not been easy to accomplish, given the unique challenges that Uganda government face in collecting, managing, and making information and services available electronically. These challenges include outdated policies, budgetary and personnel constraints, and a slow-moving, bureaucratic culture.
Web version 2(Web 2.0) and social media have only added to these challenges, and government has been slow to adjust to these new paradigms of openness, interaction, and influence. A further challenge is the proliferation of mobile devices, where and when they are an access point to government services and also where and when they are the only access point available to constituents given the lack of adequate physical infrastructure. Lastly, the issue of accessibility, where data and Webpages and services are available or not to those with disabilities further compounds the challenges of e-Government (Commission for Africa, 2004).
Background
Uganda government has strived for over a decade to provide more information and services to her constituents including the public, businesses, and other governments. Through her efforts there have been struggles given policy, resources, technology, capability, and other issues which have provided significant challenges and road blocks to conceptualizing or achieving the desired goals and results. It is challenged in recruiting and retaining the qualified and skilled resources needed to develop innovative applications and approaches. It also is challenged with being able to adeptly and quickly maneuver and adjust policies and procedures to facilitate a forward direction in electronic government (Tauberer, 2009)
