Thanks very much Ali, these are great pointers. And yes Senate ICT
committee will take it up. Will it be concluded in the 12th parliament’s
term? Please don’t hold me to it but we shall try our very best.
With regards to the excuse that tech support is so bad that government
employees resort to personal mail, they actually have a point there. A tale
is told of employees fired becuase they were not responsive yet the mail to
which the urgent request from a “very important person” went was down for
days. I have heard that employees resorting to personal mail is out of
desperation and willingness to serve in the face of non-existent
infrastructure and support. Either way, we must deal with this. This is
definitely noted and we will take it up.
On Mon, Jul 6, 2020, 08:55 Ali Hussein <[email protected]> wrote:
> Mheshimiwa
>
> Thanks for your personal attention on this matter. My two cents:-
>
> 1. First to answer your two issues.
>
> a) *T**hat government jobs are so temporary especially for a certain
> cadre of peopl*e – For as long as one is in Government employment
> everything that person does on behalf of the people of Kenya remains the
> property of the people of Kenya. I think the confusion starts when
> government employees mix personal business with government business.
> There’s a possibility here that there is a requirement for some sensitivity
> training. We do take a lot for granted but we shouldn’t. Bottomline. ALL
> OFFICIAL BUSINESS SHOULD BE DONE OFFICIALLY. ON GOVT COMMUNICATION
> CHANNELS. Which means official .go.ke emails.
> b) *Tech maintenance and support is so bad* – I will not be surprised if
> this is the case. However, this should not be an excuse for not using
> official Govt Email. To be honest, Mheshimiwa, its super embarrassing for a
> country that is kicking ass (forgive the slang) in the technology space
> worldwide to have a conversation with colleagues in say Nigeria, and one
> sentence about Government Ministers using gmail/yahoo/hotmail deflates the
> conversation. Isn’t the ICT Authority supposed to sort of act as Government
> CIO (Chief Information Officer). May be its time for a substantive
> Government Chief Information Officer responsible for all ICT issues in
> Government? including Data Centres, ICT Strategy etc? Do we need to revisit
> ICTA’s mandate?
>
> 2. In today’s world, we cannot afford sensitive government documents all
> over the world wide web on servers that we have zero control of. My sense
> is that we need to have some basic **musts** that need to be engrained in
> government employees. This could actually be an act of parliament on how
> govt operates ICT Infrastructure for its day to day operations. Here’s an
> example of how the U.K Government deals with this email issue.
>
> 3. Lastly Mheshimiwa, this issue of government email use has been
> discussed for years on this list and others. I don’t honestly think (with
> all due respect to all responsible) that it has been taken seriously
> enough. Time to take it a notch higher. Could it possibly be something that
> the Senate ICT Committee can take up and see it to its logical conclusion?
> I mean if the National Government is in such a rut when it comes to basic
> email communication can you imagine what is happening in the counties?
>
> I think that should be enough to keep you busy on this issue. 🙂
>
> *Ali Hussein*
>
> Digital Transformation
>
>
> Tel: +254 713 601113
>
> Twitter: @AliHKassim
>
> Skype: abu-jomo
>
> LinkedIn: ke.linkedin.com/in/alihkassim
> <ke.linkedin.com/in/alihkassim>
>
>
>
>
> Any information of a personal nature expressed in this email are purely
> mine and do not necessarily reflect the official positions of the
> organizations that I work with.
>
>
> On Sun, Jul 5, 2020 at 11:33 PM Abshiro Halake via kictanet <
> [email protected]> wrote:
>
>> Ali, Twahir, team,
>>
>> Great idea to enlighten the government and its agencies on this. The ICT
>> Ministry should actually take the lead. We could put a parliamentary
>> question to the ICT Ministry as to why the government continues to use
>> personal emails. That being said, I was once told that there are two
>> reasons why this is the case – 1. that government jobs are so temporary
>> especially for certain cadre of people and 2. tech maintenance and support
>> is so bad. Not sure if these are just excuses but it may be worth it to
>> still put the questions. Can someone send me a few pointers to include in
>> the question/statement? Perhaps why it is important to change this and also
>> reassurance on security etc…..
>>
>> Thanks and kind regards,
>>
>> Sen. Abshiro
>>
>> On Sat, Jul 4, 2020 at 8:26 PM Twahir Hussein Kassim via kictanet <
>> [email protected]> wrote:
>>
>>> On these lines, the central government, county governments, parastatals,
>>> constituencies etc need to take the lead.
>>>
>>> As Ali earlier in the week shared, it’s very unfortunate to see
>>> government department letterheads with a PERSONAL yahoo / gmail / hotmail
>>> address. Is it that the government is unable to host a mail server or
>>> procure a cloud service? Bottom line again you will note is the ignorance
>>> towards basic IT security.
>>>
>>> KENIC should seek to enlighten the powers that be!
>>>
>>> My 2 cents!
>>>
>>> On Sat, Jul 4, 2020, 12:55 PM Ali Hussein via kictanet <
>>> [email protected]> wrote:
>>>
>>>> Team KeNIC
>>>>
>>>> As we celebrate the 100k milestone we need to take cognisant of the
>>>> issues raised in the last AGM. We still await a comprehensive
>>>> follow-through by KeNIC. I suspect with better corporate governance the
>>>> next milestone of 100k names will be much easier to reach.
>>>>
>>>> Regards
>>>>
>>>> *Ali Hussein*
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> Tel: +254 713 601113
>>>>
>>>> Twitter: @AliHKassim
>>>>
>>>> Skype: abu-jomo
>>>>
>>>> LinkedIn: ke.linkedin.com/in/alihkassim
>>>> <ke.linkedin.com/in/alihkassim>
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> Any information of a personal nature expressed in this email are purely
>>>> mine and do not necessarily reflect the official positions of the
>>>> organizations that I work with.
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> On Wed, Apr 1, 2020 at 11:21 PM Barrack Otieno via kictanet <
>>>> [email protected]> wrote:
>>>>
>>>>> Listers,
>>>>>
>>>>> Finally we have over 100,000
>>>>> <registry.kenic.or.ke/statistics.jsp> .Ke names, what a
>>>>> milestone. Next should be the 1 Million Mark.
>>>>>
>>>>> Kudos to the KeNIC team.
>>>>>
>>>>> Regards
>>>>>
>>>>> —
>>>>> Barrack O. Otieno
>>>>> +254721325277
>>>>> +254733206359
>>>>> Skype: barrack.otieno
>>>>> PGP ID: 0x2611D86A
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>>
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>>>> sector in support of the national aim of ICT enabled growth and development.
>>>>
>>>> KICTANetiquette : Adhere to the same standards of acceptable behaviors
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>>> _______________________________________________
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>>> for people and institutions interested and involved in ICT policy and
>>> regulation. The network aims to act as a catalyst for reform in the ICT
>>> sector in support of the national aim of ICT enabled growth and development.
>>>
>>> KICTANetiquette : Adhere to the same standards of acceptable behaviors
>>> online that you follow in real life: respect people’s times and bandwidth,
>>> share knowledge, don’t flame or abuse or personalize, respect privacy, do
>>> not spam, do not market your wares or qualifications.
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>> Unsubscribe or change your options at
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>>
>> The Kenya ICT Action Network (KICTANet) is a multi-stakeholder platform
>> for people and institutions interested and involved in ICT policy and
>> regulation. The network aims to act as a catalyst for reform in the ICT
>> sector in support of the national aim of ICT enabled growth and development.
>>
>> KICTANetiquette : Adhere to the same standards of acceptable behaviors
>> online that you follow in real life: respect people’s times and bandwidth,
>> share knowledge, don’t flame or abuse or personalize, respect privacy, do
>> not spam, do not market your wares or qualifications.
>>
>
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