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{
    "id": 974373,
    "url": "https://info.mzalendo.com/api/v0.1/hansard/entries/974373/?format=api",
    "text_counter": 260,
    "type": "speech",
    "speaker_name": "Sen. Halake",
    "speaker_title": "",
    "speaker": {
        "id": 13184,
        "legal_name": "Abshiro Soka Halake",
        "slug": "abshiro-soka-halake"
    },
    "content": "Mr. Deputy Speaker, Sir, there is also the use of social media in enhancing Parliamentarians to reach out to the constituents and citizens and the role of technology in developing democratic practices. This is about embracing e-governance and cutting costs to increase accessibility, promote transparency in how we do our business, and to fight corruption. Also the best practices were resolved in terms of e-voting, biometric registration of voters, timely and collation of results, as well us broadcasting of election results. The CPA meeting was key in employing ICT. As the Vice Chairperson of the Committee on Information, Communication and Technology, this was useful. I remember in the Budget Policy Statement (BPS) that we just concluded, some of the best practices that we learnt from the CPA came in handy, in terms of how we use ICT to ensure efficiencies and monitor payables towards some of the Government programmes and projects. It was also handy in the use of digital tools to ensure maximum participation of our constituents and citizens and the use of social media platforms for feedback from our constituents. Mr. Deputy Speaker, Sir, some of the issues around the use of ICT in health, education and agriculture, including pest and locusts control came up. Early warning systems could easily have been put in place had we employed ICT. This ensures that we mitigate risks. One of the things that ICT can do for us is also public participation and constituency engagement. The innovative thing that we learnt was the virtual town hall meetings and video conferencing to entrench accountability. It enables monitoring of Bills, Motions, laws, and all our legislative processes. We have a lot of opportunity in this sector. As the Vice Chairperson of the Committee on Information, Communication and Technology, the issues around e-parliament, e-governance and virtual town hall meetings are some of the things we will be using both in our budget and project monitoring as well as public participation. Mr. Deputy Speaker, Sir, with those many remarks, this House should adopt innovative technologies to ensure that we implement some of the things provided for us in our Constitution, 2010. We also need to use ICT to entrench democracy and engagement with our communities. I thank you and beg to move."
}