Indonesian President Joko Widodo on Monday ordered government officials to halt development of new apps.
Indonesia's central and local governments run a combined total of 27,000 apps, many of which overlap or are not integrated, according to the president. New platforms are often developed every time a new minister, governor or official takes office. One ministry has been accused of running more than 500 different apps.
Application sprawl not only creates confusion and bureaucracy, but is also costly: this year alone, the government has requested a budget of 6.2 trillion rupiah ($386.3 million) for the development of new applications.
“Bureaucracy should help, not complicate and slow things down,” the president declared, telling officials that applications and data needed to be integrated.
“There can be no more excuses as I feel that the data belongs to me, my ministry, my agency and my local government,” he ordered.
The battle cry against application sprawl came at a launch ceremony for INA Digital, a unified platform for government services that is expected to help curb the proliferation of problematic platforms once it launches in September.
INA Digital is one of the projects managed by the category or department called GovTech. According to local media, the integration of national digital services will start with nine focus areas: health services, education, social assistance, digital ID based on population data, One Data Indonesia services, financial transactions, integration of portal services, services of state institutions, and online driver's licenses.
The ultimate goal will be familiar to observers of digital government services: to give citizens a single login to access government services through a portal, with all agencies sharing access to a single set of personal data.®
