Here is the final version of the interview I did for the above. The final text was edited by Aid Connect staff. A pdf version of the magazine that contains the interview is here. Tell us about your background and experience I’m the Global Lead and Senior Policy Advisor on ICT for Development and e-governance…

After a few long weeks of silence, I got an unexpected message from the innovation center asking me if there was any chance that they could drop the participation element from the overall e-governance framework we shared with them during the mission last March. Even though the constitution of the Western Cape calls for public…

As it is now customary, we will be participating in this years’ WSIS review gathering in Geneva.  But this time it seems to be a very especial occasion for three reasons: 1. UNGIS, led by ITU, is pushing hard to have another global gathering right after the new development agenda is endorsed by the UN…

We received a request from the RR in Tunis on the above. Apparently, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs is keen on moving on this as e-visas are a) a good way to capture revenue; and b) a starting point for strengthening security concerns at the national level  -with some inherent risks involved in terms of…

UNDP South Africa has been invited to be part of an expert group meeting that will discuss on the policy, legal and technical requirements for Open Government in South Africa on 5 – 6 June. Here are the remarks we drafted that will be delivered by UNDP’s Country Director

Below is the concluding sections of a crowdsourcing paper we submitted to ICEGOV 2014 for possible publication later in the year. 4.4 Main Findings All three examples studied above were undertaken by provincial and local governments where development gaps are usually more glaring. This indicates that in most cases it is probably better to start…

I was one of the 7 panellists that participated in The Guardian’s live chat on the role of technology in advancing the MDG agenda. The panel included a couple of experts on humanitarian aid which in my book is a bit different from actual development assistance. In any even below are some onf my inputs.…

As part of the CEB cybersec working group, UNDP has agreed to take the lead in two of the five thematic areas identified by the CEB Steering Committee, namely the role of cybersec in development and the post2015 agenda, and the coordination of cybersec activities of all UN agencies via UNDG. Below is the first…

Love is Colder than Death, that is the title of a film made a famous and now dead German director. This seems to be the case with IBM as our partnership refuses to die but it is usually very cold, most of the time. That is until I get this very unexpected messages from our…

For the last few months, OCHA has been developing the idea of launching a humanitarian data lab (or hub) which it sees as an expansion of the work that has been undertaken for several years now, IRIN included. The latest concept note was shared last week a few days before the conference call that took…

The Administrator will be participating  in this event on Contributions of North-South, South-South, Triangular Cooperation, and ICT for Development to the implementation of the Post-2015 Development Agenda which take place at the UN in New York on 21-22 May. She will be making a 10 minute speech. ExO has requested inputs from South-South, Post2015 and our…

Just got a last minute request from ExO to prepare a briefing on the above due at 2pm. I wonder what will happen with  stuff like this when they get rid of all of most of us in a few months…:) Background Internet governance is the name that has been given to the management and…

I will be attending this meeting that start on Thursday and which finally take place after 9 months of work and 2 previous postponements. The meeting has been scaled down quite a bit as many of the initial speakers dropped out the list as they could not handle the ever changing agenda and dates. The…

The OGP Secretariat asked all 4 multilateral partners to submit an update of activities for the upcoming OGP SC meeting which will take place in May. Here is what we submitted. After the OGP Summit in London, the UNDP Administrator sent a message to the UN Resident Coordinators and UNDP Resident Representatives in UNDP programme…

Last Friday we met with the President of the ICT for Peace Foundation to explore possible areas of collaboration. The President of the foundation is a former Swiss diplomat whom I met in 2001 and who back then was heavily involved in the organization of WSIS. The Foundation has essentially been working on crisis mapping…