19th January will always remain a proud day in the history of iridium Interactive Kenya as today is the day the Kenya Economic Stimulus Program’s website and GIS Mapping system,  www.economicstimulus.go.ke, was launched by Uhuru Kenyatta, Deputy Prime Minister of Kenya in the presence of other Cabinet ministers, Permanent Secretaries and other key officials of Govt. of Kenya. Deputy Prime Minister, Uhuru Kenyatta, stressed on the impact of this tool saying, “The presence of an online portal is expected to increase citizen interest, participation, and ownership in local development projects, and propel local community commitment and a sense of voluntarism in seeing the targeted projects through to completion.”

MPs checking their constituency data with Juliet Gateri, Business Manager of iridium Kenya

Taking governance online

iridium has conceptualized, designed and developed the Innovative ESP Monitoring & Reporting platform and portal in a record 6 weeks time.The website is a critical component of Kenya’s Economic Stimulus Program functioning as a framework to monitor, evaluate and report on the progress of the ESP projects. The objective of Kenya’s Economic Stimulus Program is to jumpstart Kenya’s economy through investments in long term solutions to better Kenya’s economic situation. The ESP focuses on empowering Kenyans with education, provide employment and entrepreneurial opportunities and promote regional development. The website covers all aspects of the program dealing with Government interventions in Education, Public health, Food, Water, Irrigation, Fresh Produce Markets, Fisheries and Industrialization. The website thus allows visitors to track the usage of resources and understand what the Government is doing to overcome the recession’s effects and the impact of these efforts on Kenya.

Uhuru Kenyatta declaring the Kenya ESP website 'Live'

iridium has worked closely with the Kenyan ESP team to deliver a website that not only covers all these aspects but provides viewers an easy to use interface by which they can understand the Government’s efforts and leverage the opportunities presented. The ESP website and GIS system have been designed as a system that promotes openness, objectivity, transparency and efficiency. By combining these with other aspects of the internet, the ESP portal provides the Kenyan Government a potent tool to communicate with citizens and deliver better governance. The innovative system drills down to constituency and project levels and allows citizens to know all the projects that are underway and on the anvil. It allows visitors to assess the impact of the measures, gives them the contact co-ordinates of the legislators from their constituencies and arms them with the information to know how effective their leaders are. The ESP website thus creates an ecosystem of accountability and transparency by keeping every stakeholder, from citizens to public servants, in the loop of communication. By combining the tool with social networking and other real time communication tools, the ESP website also helps foster communication and informs people about opportunities for growth, entrepreneurship and learning.

Deputy Prime Minister of Kenya, Uhuru Kenyatta, reviewing the portal with Sriram Bharatam

I personally believe that the usage of technologies such as GIS mapping and collaborative tools to increase the reach of this information will go a long way in helping deliver better governance. It takes considerable effort to collect data about developmental projects being performed across a country and presenting them in an easy to use interface that can help citizens understand what their Government is doing for them. The pathbreaking work done by the Kenyan Government in shaking off the shackles of the recession are laudable and even more so is their spirit in engaging iridium Interactive and Google Kenya to develop a tool that lets any of Kenya’s 39 million citizens to monitor the progress of the stimulus program and thus improves accountability and transparency.
The Economic Stimulus Programme website was declared Live by Uhuru Kenyatta a few hours ago and we are proud to be associated with the Government of Kenya in this pioneering venture.

The launch was covered extensively by the Kenyan press who believe the tool could definitely have a positive impact on monitoring the status of Kenya’s Economic Stimulus Programme.

You can read the coverage in:

1. Kenyan Broadcasting Corporation
2. Standard Media
3. Business Daily Africa
4. Daily Nation
5. Capital FM

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