University of Macau / Faculty of Social Sciences and Humanities / Department of Government and Public Administration

University of Macau / Faculty of Social Sciences and Humanities / Department of Government and Public Administration

University of Macau / Faculty of Social Sciences and Humanities / Department of Government and Public Administration

University of Macau / Faculty of Social Sciences and Humanities / Department of Government and Public Administration

University of Macau / Faculty of Social Sciences and Humanities / Department of Government and Public Administration

University of Macau / Faculty of Social Sciences and Humanities / Department of Government and Public Administration

The purpose of this study was to explore and describe Kenya Power employees’ perceptions of their adoption and implementation of online internal communication tools as a means of creating and managing long lasting relationships among all employees in the organisation. The theoretical point of departure for this study was framed within online internal communication and relationship management while principles of e-government were also considered. A single case study design was adopted for the study which combined both quantitative and qualitative data collection techniques while data was triangulated using an online self-administered questionnaire, focus group moderator’s guide and an interview schedule. The results guided by the theoretical criteria indicate that the implementation of online internal communication tools was done at Kenya Power without considering the internal stakeholders’ needs and preferences. The consequence is that employees have developed negative perceptions about internal online communication resulting in low adoption for relationship management activities. The findings of this study could be useful for other public sector organisations in that it will help them to positively change employees’ perceptions as well as enhance the implementation and adoption of internal online communication tools for the purposes of relationship building which could result in better internal communication and public sector services. / Communication Science / M.A. (Communication)

Information and Communication Technologies (ICTs) have been widely deployed in developmental programs and this has lead to the creation of a new field – ICT for Development (ICT4D). Within the context of ICT4D, various e-services are being developed, including e-Commerce, e-Government, e-Health and e-Judiciary. ICT4D projects allow Small, Medium and Micro Enterprises (SMMEs) in rural areas to increase sales and gain a market share in the global market. However, many of these ICT4D projects do not succeed, because they fail to bring enough financial value to SMMEs due to the form they currently have. An obvious example is e-Commerce, which should be a source of revenue for business organizations, but most often is not. This thesis presents the design and implementation of a rewarding and negotiation application for a shopping portal to improve the marketing of products for rural entrepreneurs. The shopping portal has been set up for the Dwesa community, a marginalized area in the Eastern Cape province of South Africa. The proposed system, called the Dwesa Rewarding Program (DRP) enables customers buying online to get points for some of the activities carried out on the shopping portal. It also allows customers to negotiate and make offers whilst purchasing and get rewarded for buying online. The novelty of the system is in its flexibility and adaptability. One achievement of this system is the establishment of negotiation rules which allows fairness in rewarding customers. This should in turn lead to increased sales on the e-Commerce platform in marginalized areas and subsequently increased effectiveness of ICT4D for socio-economic development

Many scholars lament of poor infrastructure to manage and preserve digital records within the public sector in South Africa to support electronic government (egovernment). For example, in South Africa, the national archives’ repository and its subsidiary provincial archives do not have infrastructure to ingest digital records into archival custody. As a result, digital records are left to the creating agencies to manage and preserve. The problem is compounded by the fact that very few public sector organisations in South Africa have procured systems to manage digital records. Therefore, a question is how are digital records managed and stored in these organisations to support e-government? Do public organisations entrust their records to the cloud as an alternative storage given the fact that both physical and virtual storages are a problem? If they do, how do they ensure accessibility, governance, security and long-term preservation of records in the cloud? Utilising the Digital Curation Centre (DCC) Lifecycle Model as a guiding framework, this qualitative study sought to explore digital curation of records in the cloud to support e-government services in South Africa with the view to propose a framework that would guide the public sector to migrate records to the cloud storage. Semi-structured interviews were employed to collect data from the purposively selected Chief Information Officers in the national government departments that have implemented some of the electronic services such as the Department of Arts and Culture, Department of Home Affairs, Department of Higher Education and Training and the Department of Basic Education. Furthermore, the National Archives and Records Services of South Africa was also chosen as it is charged with the statutory regulatory role of records management in governmental bodies. So is the State Information Technology Agency (SITA), a public sector ICT company established in 1999 to consolidate and coordinate the state’s information technology resources in order to achieve cost savings through scale, increase delivery capabilities and enhance interoperability. Interview data were augmented through document analysis of legislation and policies pertaining to data storage. Data were analysed thematically and interpreted in accordance with the objectives of the study. The key finding suggests that although public servants informally and unconsciously put some records in the clouds, government departments in South Africa are sceptical to entrust their records to the cloud due to a number of reasons, such as lack of policy and legislative framework, lack of trust to the cloud storage, jurisdiction, legal implications, privacy, ownership and security risks. This study recommends that given the evolution of technology, the government should regulate cloud storage through policy and legislative promulgation, as well as developing a government-owned cloud managed through SITA in order for all government departments to use it. This study suggests a framework to migrate paperbased records to cloud storage that is controlled by the government. / Information Science / D.Lit. et Phil. (Information Science)

This study assessed the digital preservation capability maturity readiness within the context of e-government in Botswana Public Service with a view to developing a strategic framework that ensures digital continuity. There some studies that have been conducted in Botswana regarding digital preservation but they did not provide a framework which could be used as an assessment to check their capability in digital preservation as e-government progresses so that digital information is continuously being used for decision making over time. The study adopted a pragmatic paradigm and embedded mixed method approach; whereby a cross sectional survey and case study were deployed in each of the 6 selected ministries as a unit of analysis. The target study respondents comprises of 5 Senior Managers, 4 Managers - Human Resources and Administration, 6 ICT Managers, 40 Records Management Officers,12 Information Technology Officers, 1 Performance Improvement Coordinator, 1 Project Manager, 8 Archivists, 1 Assistant Deputy Manager and 1 Deputy Managers- Management Services. The data was collected through interviews, questionnaires, personal observations, and documents analysis. Both qualitative and quantitative data were collected sequentially and simultaneously where one form of data supported or complemented each other so as to have one form of data play a supportive role to the other. Data analysis was achieved through the triangulation of both qualitative and quantitative data in order to yield a single interpretation and conclusion drawn. The findings of the study showed that the Botswana Public Service has no unified national information systems used to manage public sector records leading to some ministries adopting their own electronic records management systems. Currently few ministries have implemented the electronic records management system and majority of the digital records are not preserved due to lack of preservation guidelines and strategies. The study further established the lack of preservation policies and skills in managing and preserving digital records in Botswana Public Service. In that regard, the study developed a strategic framework for digital preservation capability maturity readiness in the context of e-government in the Botswana Public Sector. The ultimate aim of the framework is to ensure digital continuity and make sure that e-government is sustained for the benefit of an open government and increased participatory citizenry. / Information Science / D. Litt. et Phil. (Information Science)