The President of Uganda H.E. Yoweri Kaguta Museveni has today launched the first Tier 3 data center in Uganda. Located in Jinja, the data center has been constructed by government of Uganda through National Information Technology – Uganda (NITA – U), seeks to help government avoid duplication of information and wastage of resources.
The facility will house all government ICT infrastructure and will host disaster recovery services for government applications and data. The Tier 3 data center guarantees 99.98% up-time, which means that government e-services will always be up, with increased access speed, security and low management costs. Over 57 government agencies have already moved their data systems to the facility.
“We have systems for (Ministry of) Education, Ministry of Gender and Labour, Immigration, Uganda Investment Authority,” NITA-U Executive Manager Mr James Saaka said in part of the interview.
In recent years, the government has taken big steps in improving the ICT sector in Uganda with projects like implementing the National Backbone Infrastructure aimed at lowering internet costs, the provision of MY UG WiFi in selected towns in the country, introduction of e-Visas, among others.
The Data Center should allow integration and sharing of data among different government authorities and save Ugandans from registering for different things almost every month. There is no harm in sharing selected data captured by National Identification and Registration Authority (NIRA) to the Immigration authority, telecoms, police and other relevant agencies.
This will save Ugandans time in registration everywhere, access to government services, and would save government the burden of having duplicate data as well as enjoying other benefits that come with using a shared secure up-to-date data center with collaborating databases.