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This essay elucidates the challenges of public sector innovation in Somalia and proposes potential solutions. It synthesises documentary research with four succinct case studies to discern the policy and organisational barriers that predominantly hinder experimentation, scaling, and institutionalisation of improved methodologies. At the policy level, restrictive fiscal constraints, inflexible public financial management and procurement processes, along with inadequate data and platform governance, limit the capacity for experimentation and expansion. At the organisational level, deficiencies in capabilities, cultures dominated by compliance, inadequate portfolio management, and fragmented coordination across central, line, and federal member states hinder iteration and spread. The overarching fragility, insecurity, and climate disturbances in Somalia amplify the perceived consequences of failure, hence intensifying risk aversion. The article presents a Somalia-specific, multi-tiered barrier model consistent with OECD/OPSI principles and the GovTech modernisation agenda, and suggests practical enabling mechanisms: a pre-approved experimentation period within public financial management regulations, guidance for procurement aimed at innovation, pathways to scalability through national payment and identification systems, and focused capacity development linked to civil service remuneration and grading reform. The assertion is clear: absent safeguarded fiscal and procedural environments for regulated risk-taking and a measured yet rigorous expansion of organisational innovation capacities, Somalia's potential digital and institutional changes will fail to achieve their intended outcomes.

This paper examines the role of social media in enhancing public participation within the Mossel Bay Municipality, focusing on both opportunities and challenges. While social media platforms have become important channels for communication, participation, and accountability between citizens and local government, their integration into governance processes in South Africa remains underexplored. Existing literature primarily focuses on national-level initiatives or metropolitan municipalities, leaving a gap in understanding the dynamics of social media use in smaller municipal contexts. This research addresses this gap by investigating how social media platforms can strengthen citizen engagement, participation, and accountability in a local municipality. Employing a qualitative approach, the study involved semi-structured interviews with 20 participants, including municipal officials, councillors, and ward committee members. The findings reveal that social media offers significant opportunities to engage diverse audiences, particularly youth, working adults, and urban populations often excluded from traditional participation channels. However, challenges such as digital inequality, limited interaction, and insufficient strategic planning constrain its effectiveness. The study underscores the need for Mossel Bay Municipality to move beyond one-way communication and develop a comprehensive social media strategy with clear goals, interactive mechanisms, and inclusive engagement practices. By focusing on a local municipal context, this research advances e-governance scholarship in South Africa, highlighting practical strategies for leveraging social media to enhance participatory governance and promote social inclusion.

This study determines the challenges faced by Local Government Authorities in the use of e-record keeping for Human Resource Management (HRM). The study was conducted at Morogoro Municipal Council (MMC) as among the Local Government Authorities (LGAs) which continue to use paper-based record keeping in Tanzania. A case study design was employed to ensure an in-depth understanding of the phenomenon. A questionnaire and interviews were used in collecting data from 107 respondents. Data from the questionnaire were analysed descriptively through the Statistical Package for Social Sciences (SPSS) whereby means and standard deviatons were calculated. On the other hand, data from interviews were analysed through content analysis. The study was guided by two models, which are Kurt Lewin’s Change Management Model, as the guiding model, and ADKAR Change Management Model, as the supporting model. The study revealed lack of reliable internet service, lack of top management support, inadequate IT experts, staff resistance, and inadequate funds as the main challenges facing MMC in the use of electronic record (e-record) keeping for HRM. This implies that, in some cases, the government formulates good policies without ensuring a conducive environment for their implementation. In the light of the revealed challenges, the study recommends that LGAs especially MMC should take initiatives to develop and implement a comprehensive e-governance programme that, among other things, will address the revealed challenges. In addition, the government should creation environments that support implementation of its policies particularly those related to ICT and e-governance.  

This article argues that digitization of services is increasingly becoming an international phenomenon. As a case in point, the South African Post Office by its very nature and as part of the global institution requires a serious conversion from traditional service provision to digital and electronic services provision. This article is based on the study that was conducted in the South African Post Office in the Limpopo and Mpumalanga Province. From the South African Post Office perspective, Limpopo and Mpumalanga Provinces are referred to as North Region. The primary objective of the study was to investigate the implications of digitization on service delivery in the South African Post Office, focusing in the Limpopo and Mpumalanga Provinces (North Region). The study found that service delivery is adversely affected due to non-digitization of postal services. The study recommended interventions that can be employed to improve postal service delivery. The research method employed in the study was of both quantitative and qualitative method. The majority of the respondents strongly agreed that digitization of postal services could improve service delivery and brings more income and service improvement to clients. The article concludes by providing suggestions towards improving service delivery in the South African Post Office by digitizing postal services.

This study was motivated by the need to shift from the illusory perception of longing for e-Governance to be declared a new paradigm of Public Administration. Public Administration is said to be static, but yet dynamic. Implying that the dynamics of Public Administration can incorporate electronic governance (e-Governance) to improve matters of governance, public service delivery, accountability and transparency in public affairs. However, even with an incongruous adoption and implementation of Information and Communication Technologies (ICTs) within the South African government, this study shed light on the empirical and systematic evidence and analytical distinction between e-Governance and public administration. The analysis suggests that the complexity and implication of e-Governance via the use of ICTs may enhance government efficacy. Still, it cannot be entirely trusted in maintaining administration and government-businesses-citizens interaction partly due to its rapid technological changes and the various conditions of its implementation within different nations including South Africa. With the aid of qualitative research methods, which heavily relied on secondary data gathered from scholarly journals, academic books, trusted databases and websites, this study reveal that there is scant evidence to support research in incorporating e-Governance as a new paradigm of Public Administration due to the imbalance, network failures, inadequate ICTs infrastructure to govern in a democratic manner which include all citizens. This study concludes that e-Governance is already analysed from a public administration dynamic and complementary perspective implying that it is an analytically and structurally incomplete reform to take its full form as a new Public Administration paradigm due to its rapid technological changes.

The study explored the adoption of information communication technologies (ICT) and its integration in Africa as an e-Government system. The article contributes to the continuing debate regarding the constraints that developing-country e-government systems face when it comes to the implementation and adoption of ICT as e-Governance for service delivery and the realization of socio-economic development. The study covers the various stakeholders who may have an impact on the implementation of e-Government at the grassroots level. It also highlights the barriers cited by other scholars of e-Governance that require local government attention. The impediments include challenges with governance, access to resources, leadership, ICT skills and funding. The study primarily relies on secondary data that is available in both the private and public domain to produce qualitative primary data. The research observations are on the essential role that local municipalities play in pursuing e-Government by using inductive thematic data analysis. The research concluded that the planning and implementation of e-governance should focus on finding methods to address a variety of issues which includes amongst other ensuring that the existing e-Governance initiatives gives valuable insight into what works and what does not, and provides meaningful guidance in developing and refining e-governance.

The current perspective of understanding development focuses on including all members of society participating in the growth process, primarily through digital technology. This paper examines social media for promoting inclusive growth in Tanzania. More specifically, the study aims to investigate the social media site that youth citizens widely use to discuss government economic issues for fostering inclusive growth, how youth citizens use the perceived widely used social media to participate in discussing government issues for inclusive growth, and how does the government encourage citizens’ use of social media to discuss government issues for inclusive growth. The study was conducted in Dodoma City and employed mixed research methods using survey and interview data collection methods. Findings show that youth citizens mainly prefer using WhatsApp social media to discuss economic issues to promote inclusive economic growth in the study area. The study also found that youth citizens in the study area use WhatsApp social media to spot government actions and voice their opinions for inclusive growth. The study concludes that WhatsApp social media is a gateway to accelerate inclusive growth in the study area. It suggests a networked digital policymaking framework to encourage citizens to openly discuss and publish government issues on social media without fear to accelerate inclusive growth in the country. Also, it suggests an established framework for collecting citizens’ opinions on social media for government decision-making practices to imply that citizens’ views are considered for inclusive growth in Tanzania.

This study aims to increase knowledge and understanding of Government-to-Business (G2B) Services in Myanmar and will also discover the critical challenges for G2B e-Service provision in Myanmar. The government officials from the agencies providing G2B services are surveyed to explore the current status of G2B services in Myanmar. Questionnaires were analyzed quantitatively and qualitatively, with the respondents identifying themselves as they currently work at government agencies. The study revealed that among the total 30 Ministries, it is 24 % of public services are available online. The current study found that ICT infrastructure barriers, legal and policy issues, and financial barriers are significant challenges that delay the progress of G2B e-Service implementation in Myanmar. The ICT infrastructure, particularly regarding data center, are still considered inadequate, and financial and technical assistance is in demand for implementing the G2B e-Service. Social and cultural barriers are the fewer obstacles found in the analysis, with an overall rate of 87.3% positive opinion on the digital transformation of G2B services. This study will support several contributions to implementing e-Government services in Myanmar and provide awareness about G2B e-Service in Myanmar.

This study aims to investigate users’ satisfaction with e-Government services of Myanmar through a study of a specific e-Government service, the Myanmar Companies Online registration (MyCO) system. The MyCO system was chosen for this study because it is the initiative well-developed e-Government service in Myanmar. On the other hand, the company registration authority of Myanmar, the Directorate of Investment and Company Administration (DICA), has continuously made every endeavor to optimize responsive its e-Government services, after almost four years from the launching date of the MyCO system, systematically analyzing for optimizing the system still remains to research. In order to track public perception of the system, an online survey was conducted. The questionnaires were designed based on the Technology Acceptance Model in the fields of customer satisfaction consisting mainly of three main factors, perceived ease of use, perceived usefulness and perceived risk. Questionnaires were collected and analyzed with the respondents identifying themselves as having used the MyCO system. Notwithstanding the overall 79% of respondents were very satisfied and 20% were satisfied to some extent, payment transaction issues and some technical challenges are still remained in the system to be addressed to become a better user-centric public service. This study will support a number of contributions to find out the gap between e-Government services implementation and how publics’ expectations of e-Government services. The result of this study will provide awareness to DICA to improve more efficiency and effectiveness in implementing best practices in the provision of user-centric public services based on the public’s needs and demands.

This paper aims to examine the impact of IS Implementation on User Performance in the county Government of Machakos, Kenya. This paper made use of descriptive designs as well explanatory study designs. In addition, the research made use of primary data that was gathered using open and closed-ended questions in a research questionnaire. Data collected were analyzed using the SPSS software. It was established that IS implementation had a positive effect on user performance which in return impacts the organizational performance. The study revealed that IS's ability is to provide high-quality information, which reduces errors and resolves performance problems when they occur. The study concluded that IS is a major factor influencing user performance in Machakos County Government, Kenya and that there was a positive relationship between independent variables and dependent variables. Therefore, this study recommends that County Governments should invest heavily in IS without fear as this will improve their employee’s performance and in return improve the performance of the County Governments in terms of service delivery to the citizens.

Service delivery protests in the recent past demonstrate the dire state of local government in South Africa. The absence of public sector innovation can be linked to service delivery backlogs hence embracing digital innovations (Internet of Things (IoT), Big data and analytics, cloud, Biometrics, computers, mobile applications, 3D machines) in the Fourth Industrial Revolution (4IR) is strategic for enhancing municipal service provision and uplifting the living standards of citizens in communities.  The study utilised an explorative qualitative case study design premised on an extensive literature and document review analysis to examine the barriers facing the City of Tshwane from adopting digital innovations in the 4IR. The analysis of documents revealed digital hesitancy, leadership void, lack of innovative research culture, weak municipal preparedness, and digital divide in adopting digital innovations are barriers to digital innovation adoption to enhance service delivery. The paper observes further the lack of systematic and evaluative studies to inform public sector innovation, or growth in digital innovations often led to implementation challenges in the City of Tshwane. Conclusions drawn for the article revealed that adopting digital innovations can be the panacea to accelerating urban service delivery in the City of Tshwane; hence institutional readiness, improved revenue streams, including a stable regulatory and policy environment, are imperatives in achieving a digitalised local government in the 4IR.

This conceptual paper's objectives describe how the utilization of technology and information systems in government institutions developing e-government can improve public service performance and quality. The development of information and technology helps humans and the organization to successfully their operation. The operational system more accurate, useful, and efficient. Most governmental bodies have a low-performance rate in matters of bureaucracy. To repair the quality of bureaucratic performance in government institutions, there is a need to introduce public transparency and accountability to increase the role of public control. The usage of modern technology and systems in government is known as e-government.