The National Information and Technology Development Agency (NITDA) has taken its campaign, the clearing house for all federal government information technology (IT) projects, to the Office of the Accountant General of the Federation, the Office of the Auditor General of the Federation and the Bureau of Public Procurement.

It highlights the imperative of scrutinising all IT projects to enhance value. Its visit to the institutions focused on the presentation of NITDA’s Reviewed IT Project Clearance Guidance Document—an updated framework designed to standardise the planning, funding, and execution of IT projects in line with national digital economy goals.
  
The document, a revision of the 2018 Guidelines for Clearance of IT Projects, emphasises cost-effectiveness, regulatory compliance and transparency, reinforcing NITDA’s role as the clearing house for all government IT initiatives under the National Information Technology Development Act (2007.)

During the visits, NITDA’s Director-General, Inuwa Kashifu, emphasised that the Agency cannot work in isolation to achieve the Renewed Hope Agenda of transforming the economy digitally.

“And we need to explore how we can strengthen our partnerships and collaborations in line with the President’s agenda,” he said. He averred that there is a need to be more focused and intentional in the implementation of IT projects if the country wants to maintain its leading position in Africa.

“About 56 per cent of IT projects failed to deliver on what was promised because we go for the latest technology, and failure to design before building the technology and lack of consideration for the business value proposition, we are trying to deliver with the projects,” he stated.

Inuwa informed his hosts that to safeguard against that, NITDA has reviewed the IT Clearance Guideline because experience has shown that most ministries, departments and agencies build IT projects based on the proposal submitted to them by the contractors who would design the projects, implement them and operate them which give no room for accountability and transparency and that has led to the failure of many IT projects.

“We are building a digitised government service, and the government is one. We need to work together, work harmoniously, the same way the IT system works to deliver these services. For us to achieve this, we need to be more intentional in the way we design and implement. And if we continue to design and implement in silos, they will never work together,” he warned.

The NITDA DG maintained that the idea behind the reviewed guideline is to ensure that IT projects are designed in line with the mindset of interoperability for Ministries, Departments and Agencies (MDAs) to explore shared services and follow the best practices and standards.

He said the guideline will guide MDAs on how to design, operate and maintain systems because building these systems is beyond technology, but people, processes and key components are paramount.

The DG of the Bureau of Public Procurement, Dr Adebowale Adedokun, stressed the significance of standardising IT Project Bidding Documents. He remarked: “It is disheartening that organisations misuse IT projects to siphon public funds—resources that could otherwise be channelled towards impactful initiatives that can transform the country.”

He disclosed that MDAs come with IT projects that were adopted without standardisation and guidelines, “but with this new guideline, our decision should pave the way for the development of the IT sector of the country.”