Government departments are to be connected to a single, faster, more efficient computer network costing R454-million, Public Service and Administration Minister Geraldine Fraser-Moleketi said on Wednesday.
The country’s second national telecommunications operator, Neotel, was awarded a five-year contract worth R378-million to provide ”backbone transmission services”, Fraser-Moleketi told reporters in Johannesburg.
The Next Generation Network (NGN) will replace the government’s current single wide-area network and provide improved stability, capacity and additional services, such as advanced data, voice and video.
”This project will give us the capacity to provide services in support of our e-government strategy.”
In turn, the project would make ”the single public service a reality” through inter-operability and seamless service delivery.
Public service delivery would be improved through e-education, tele-medicine through e-health projects, connectivity to multipurpose community centres and strengthening collaboration between the three tiers of government (national, provincial and local), she said.
The project will be implemented by the State Information Technology Agency (Sita) and the R454-million will be spent over five years.
Through Neotel twice the amount of bandwidth will be available. The company’s ”bandwidth on demand” was much cheaper than the next closest offer.
”In utilising Neotel, Sita is ensuring that cheaper telecommunications for government can become a reality,” Fraser-Moleketi said.
Business Connexion will upgrade the backbone to Cisco technology and supply, install and support the network equipment for three years. This would cost more than R76-million, excluding maintenance.
Navin Singh, Sita general manager of converged communications, said Sita currently has 25 ”points of presence” across the country serving 3000 offices of government departments.
”There will be a gradual migration of the old to the new,” said
The first NGN phase is expected to be completed by October 2007.
In response to a question on the beleaguered new electronic traffic system, eNaTIS, Fraser-Moleketi said: ”There are lessons that can be learned.”
Sita had provided expertise and collaborated with the Department of Transport at Transport Minister Jeff Radebe’s request, she said.
Sita’s chief of business operations, Noedine Isaacs-Mpulo, said the entire new network had been simulated at the Cisco labs in San Francisco ”to ensure the design of the network is workable”.
Sita will fund the project and funds are self-generated through charges to clients connected to its services, said spokesperson Elton Fortuin.
Sixteen non-inter-operational networks existed within the government prior to the implementation of the current network, the Government Common Core Network, in 2002.
Core capacity requirements had subsequently grown by 150% year-on-year. — Sapa