Gauteng govt allocates R985m for ICT
The Gauteng Department of Finance (GDF) says it has intensified its efforts towards ensuring that Gauteng becomes a smart and connected city region, in order to bridge the digital divide.
In presenting the Gauteng Department of Finance budget vote for 2013/2014, Gauteng Finance MEC, Mandla Nkomfe said that the department was allocated a budget of R985 million for the 2013/14 financial year.
“The bulk of these resources will be appropriated towards realising the GPG’s ICT strategic outcomes, in order to drive ICT transformation initiatives in the province.”
“To this end, our broadband network infrastructure will be implemented in a phased approach, where the Gauteng Online network will receive first priority. This will be followed by connecting government buildings, eServices to other Departments, and the 20 Priority Townships,” Nkomfe said.
The MEC said that, to date, significant milestone have been achieved towards the provision of reliable Information Communications Technology (ICT). In this regard, over 99.86% uptime availability of the GPG’s Wide Area Networks (WAN) has been achieved.
Other achievements in this area include:
- A new agreement to provide data repository, security and recovery with an offsite data centre facility;
- Stabilising our Local Area Network (LAN) and Wide Area Networks (WAN);
- Investing in a world class Security Operations Centre (SOC), and in a fully operational Network Operations Centre (NOC), both of which proactively monitor our operating systems.
“We currently support 1,538 computer laboratories in Gauteng Public Schools under the Gauteng Online (GoL) Schools Project. However, this flagship project is currently under strategic review to incorporate comprehensive components of e-Education, which were excluded from the original scope,” Nkomfe said.
“As a result, we anticipate that the GoL will soon be underpinned by the Gauteng Broadband Network when this has stabilized. Similarly, we intend to align the GoL programme to e-Education ingenuities that are currently being implemented by National Departments,” the MEC said.
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