By Andrew Irumba
Kampala: On Thursday, HE. Yoweri Kaguta Museveni announced a reshuffle of Permanent Secretaries that saw at least seven of them kicked into retirement which he said was done in honour of ‘public interest’.
“By the powers given to President by Article 99,172 (1) (a) of the Constitution of the Republic of Uganda and the Uganda Public Service Standing Order (A-n), I hereby retire the following Permanent Secretaries in the Public Interest,” read part of a statement issued by PPU signed by President Museveni.
In the new reshuffle, Vincent Waiswa Bagiire who was the Permanent Secretary of the Ministry of ICT and National Guidance since November 2016 was posted to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs replacing Amb. Patrick Mugoya and replaced by Dr. Aminah Zawedde, a Board Member of the National Information Technology Authority (NITA) Uganda and a Non-Executive Director DFCU Group.
But Who Is Zawedde?
Dr Aminah Zawedde holds a PhD from the Eindhoven University of Technology, a PGDip in Educational Technologies from the University of Cape Town, a PGD in Education from IUIU, an MSc. Computer Science and a BSc. of Statistics and Economics from Makerere University.
She has experience as an IT consultant on both local and international projects. Her expertise includes; ICT advisory, Business transformation, economy digitalization, research, modelling for decision support, process improvement, system integration, and capacity building among others. In addition, she also leads research projects on capacity building for sustainable ICT4D.
Her expertise includes; ICT advisory, Business transformation, economy digitalization, research, modelling for decision support, process improvement, system integration and capacity building among others.
She was a member of the International System Dynamics Society, and founding member of the System Dynamics Africa Chapter and is currently the Organizing Secretary of this Chapter. She has written and published papers in IT peer-reviewed journals and presented some at international conferences.
During her tenure as Board Director and Chairperson of the Digital Transformation Committee NITA-U, owing to her role of guiding policy direction and strategies, numerous achievements have been registered.
The Ugandan Government currently boasts of the largest and most stable optical fiber cable network in the country, the NBI, spanning over 4000 Kilometers and providing internet connectivity to over 1000 Government offices.
Uganda’s online space is regulated by the Data Protection and Privacy Act, the Computer Misuse Act and the Electronic Transactions Act. The cost of the Internet to the government, through a deliberate process, dropped from 1200 US dollars per Mbps per month in 2013 to the current 70 US dollars per Mbps per month.
Various NITA-U e-Government initiatives have been rolled out. These include; the Unified Messaging and Collaboration System, a communications system rolled out in over 75 entities with over 17,000 users, ePay an Electronic Payment Gateway a platform that enables convenient and secure online payments, uConnect an SMS Gateway which provides subsidized SMS services, and eGP a web-based system that supports a complete cycle of public procurement and disposal and a 24-hour Government of Uganda IT Service Desk.
The Government of Uganda also established National Cloud Data Centre and Disaster Recovery sites currently providing centralized hosting to over 160 critical E-Government systems and applications among numerous other achievements.
She starts her tenure as Permanent Secretary as the Government of Uganda is rolling out UGhub, a systems Integration platform to enable seamless sharing of data in a rational, secure, efficient and sustainable manner a platform she has played a central role in bringing to life.
Spy Uganda congratulates and welcomes you to our line sector. We wish you a good stay.
