The Great Digital Leap Forward

The new government’s 100-point good governance plan was released on 28 March, just one day after Balendra Shah was sworn in as prime minister. This was a statement of ambition, and the first move of a government that has promised to be focused on delivering results.

It was a document that moved with the times with its main theme being digital governance.  Over 35 of the 100 points mention tech in one form or another: tech reforms in taxes, healthcare, agriculture, project monitoring, accountability and law enforcement.

However, the timelines are deemed unrealistic, and sometimes outright contradictory. While there are specific gems, digitisation has been thrown around as a panacea that will cure all our ills. In that sense it is not really a strategy document, more a to-do list.

Successful implementation will require careful planning and execution. The good news is that the RSP government, with its near supermajority in the legislature for the next five years (hopefully) has a reasonable timeframe to deliver on many of the clauses.

The document does identify the biggest problems that hold the country back: the governance obstacles that cause the average Nepali the most pain and loss of time.

Clause 10, for example, states candidly: ‘To address the situation where service delivery across all public bodies has become slow, costly, and ineffective due to duplication, complexity, and unnecessary processes, conduct a comprehensive review of procedures in each institution; remove unnecessary and duplicative processes; limit approval layers to a maximum of three...’

The document identifies that there must be a way for related offices and ministries to share data and talk to each other. Clause 67 points out that the Company Registrar’s Office, Department of Industry, and Ministry of Commerce, Supplies and Consumer Protection must be digitised and able to use each other’s data.

Startup registration should be done within two days with an autofill system. Indeed, if Nepalis have to go through labyrinthine processes to get a citizenship certficate, national ID and passport, the least the state can do is make all three easy to get. And the way to do that is to retrieve digital data instantly whenever needed. 

At the moment, forms for IDs and licenses have to be filled online, but a hardcopy still needs to be printed out for fingerprinting and signatures. 

The Plan aims to fit all public transport with dashcams and CCTV cameras, and Clause 64 envisages a ‘central dashboard with KPIs for nationally prioritised projects, ministry-level performance tracking, and a problem and obstacle resolution mechanism’ so the PMO can review progress at the click of the mouse.

The document aims at a faceless, time-bound, trackable digital systems, somewhat like a blockchain approach. Most of the document is not that specific, and read as if digital transformation of government will be magical and super-efficient.

Clause 50, for example aims to ‘resolve irregularities, misuse of advance payments, and delays’ by implementing a ‘data-based end-to-end e-procurement monitoring system’ in three months. But why did these irregularities happen in the first place? What elements of the procurement process, such as hiring the cheapest contractors, allowed for substandard systems? 

Digitisation puts the cart before the horse. The new government first needs to take a long hard look at the culture of government, its inertia, lethargy and greasing palms. 

Otherwise, the inefficiencies will just make their way into the technology. 

The timelines look overly ambitious. Complex, national-level systems that need coordination and data sharing are given only 30, 60, or 90 days to accomplish. This is a hope, and not a plan.

Also, it is not possible to draft an IT and E-governance Bill (Point#40), establish an Independent Regulatory Authority (Point#38), and build out a national data exchange platform (Point#36) all within 60 days, in parallel. These are steps that must happen one after another.

The part about Digital Governance is actually the weakest. Points#28 to #42 contain multiple targets to reduce unnecessary steps, setting up different bodies and regulators, and passing bills. This would actually add redundancy and bureaucracy The Plan was supposed to do away with.

There are glaring omissions. Such a complex, interconnected national data sharing system should have cyber security safeguards as the highest priority. There is also no acknowledgement of the existing digital infrastructure used by the government. Will these systems be scrapped? Integrated? Superceded?

AI and its applications are conspicuously absent from the document. And what of integrating feedback from citizens who will be the end consumer of these digital systems and services. 

Despite these flaws, the 100-point Plan identifies what needs to be done and setting goals. This is a lot more than any previous government has done. But given how prominently tech appears in the plan, perhaps we are owed another document about how it is all going when the government has completed 100 days. 

Nepali tech talent is booming both domestically and in the diaspora. Under the right conditions and for decent salaries, the government could certainly put together the requisite teams to build the digital skeleton on which Nepal will function from here on out.

Vishad Raj Onta