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The Nigerian Federal ministries, departments and agencies (MDAs) have been asked to ensure they include provisions for warranty, downtime and after-sale support in their Service Level Agreements (SLAs) in order to reduce cost incurred by government in the procurement of IT products and services.
The Director General, National Information Technology Development Agency (NITDA), Kashifu Inuwa Abdullahi, stated this week in Abuja at the Consumer Protection Forum tagged ‘Review of the Guidelines for Introduction of SLA in Government Contracts.’
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According to the NITDA boss, the objectives of the guideline which is in consonance with Section 6a, 17, 18(4) and 32 of the NITDA Act 2007 is to ensure that IT projects in government are implemented and supported in a sustainable and timely manner.
Also to ensure that IT services to government are of consistent good quality and delivered in a way that enable government to get the best value for investment in digital technology assets.
Abdullahi said NITDA intends to commence the development of culture of compliance to SLAs when implementing government IT contracts.
“The NITDA IT Clearance has proven to be a great cost cutter for the Federal Government,” said Abdullahi who was represented by the Director, Standards, Guideline and Framework, Mr. Oladejo Olawunmi.
Describing the forum as a platform that brings the consumers and vendors of IT products and services together to address areas of challenges in IT service delivery, the NITDA boss noted that it will also create awareness on consumers’ rights on IT products and services to ensure efficient and effective service delivery.
He said the Consumer Protection Forum would serve as platform that identifies hinderances to digital economy growth in Nigeria.
“Two weeks ago, NITDA had a very successful international conference, the Digital Nigeria International Conference where the need to pull down barriers which stifle innovation in the Digital Economy was highly recommended. The Consumer Protection Forum is a platform to identify such barriers,” He said.
Adding: “NITDA, under its mandate of regulation of the IT sector in Nigeria and in furtherance of its Developmental Regulation pillar, which is one of the seven pillars of the Agency’s Strategic Roadmap and Action Plan (SRAP 2021-2024) is always seeking to ensure the efficient and effective delivery of IT products and services. This is more so because of the significant role IT has played on the country’s economy in recent years and the more critical need for the Digital Economy to provide the much-needed succor from the prevailing global economic downturn.”
He said there was a need to have a “viable enabling environment” for the digital economy to thrive, adding that it is not only enough to only have innovations in the emerging technologies but to ensure that playersin the industry thrive under a mutually cohesive environment which makes the SLAs an imperative.
The lead reviewer of the guideline, Barrister Babatunde Bamigboye in a sideline interview explained that the guideline is to ensure sustainability of government IT projects and services among the Federal Public Institution. He said the move would help the government to save cost.
“The SLAs means that government will not have to be spending money repeatedly on ICT. Once we have achieved one, we move on to the others. That is the ultimate goal and it would make our digital economy be built on something that is sustainable because if we are talking about the digital economy, the infrastructure should be on solid ground in terms of ICT and how can we get the solid infrastructure if we don’t have agreements or guidelines on how to get those infrastructures in place,” he said.
Participants at the event were drawn from various MDAs and were unanimous that the implementation of guidelines would ensure efficient products and services delivery.
