IS EL SALVADOR IMPLEMENTING E-GOVERNMENT?

Many Salvadorans are seeing as positive the fact that Nayib Bukele is using social media to inform about each step that he is taking in public administration. Given that most of the population has access to a smartphone and to internet and social networks, information can quickly flow and reach people who were not reached before.

   According to Saugata and Masud (2007), e-governance can be defined as the use of the information and communication technologies (ICT) in order to provide government services, which are expected to be more efficient. Therefore, the exchange of information and communication between the government and the citizens, as well as other government services in the whole system such as health and education, are delivered to the people in a much faster and transparent way. This is what the millennial Salvadoran President, Nayib Bukele, proposed during his presidential campaign, and it is what he has delivered in his first 7 days as President of El Salvador.

   One of the most commented strategies during this first week as President has been the way in which he has fired government officials. It is normal to have a change of personnel in the key government institutions with every new administration. Usually, the new President fires those officials who were close to the past President and hire new officials whom are supposed to be close to the new President. This process is usually done quietly. Nayib Bukele, on the other hand, has fired over 20 officials via Twitter. Obviously, there is a due process that is followed, but the President has chosen to publicly inform who is going to be removed from their duties and who is the Minister or official responsible for this process. The Ministers and officials respond in a matter of minutes, also via Twitter, saying that they will proceed accordingly.

   Bukele gives the order to fire a person by writing their name, their relationship with the FMLN party members, and their salaries. What is peculiar about this methodology is the intention of revealing the latent nepotism in the whole government apparatus, given the fact that all the fired people so far are relatives of the ex President or relatives of the members of the now opposition party FMLN, which ruled El Salvador for the past ten years. In other words, the Salvadoran people are finding out that the past administration violated the law hiring several of their relatives giving them high positions for which they are not qualified. It is not that the people did not know about the existing nepotism. What they did not know was the magnitude of such a violation to the law.

   This way, Bukele is being transparent by revealing the reason of the dismissal and how high their salaries were. This has helped exacerbate an already existing sentiment of disgust towards the political party FMLN, given that they are a left-wing party and always promised to fight for the people. Having their relatives in high positions (for which most of them are not qualified) and giving them high salaries cannot be considered as helping the people they promised to fight for. It is seen as corruption. Many people are criticizing this way in which the new President is communicating with the people. However, most of the people seem to be happy because they now have direct access to information they did not have in the past.

   Nayib Bukele has also chosen to use social networks in order to inform the people about who his new Ministers are and their previous experience, as well as their entire resumes. He did this with most of his new cabinet Ministers. All this information plus the fact that the new cabinet is composed of 50% of women and 50% of men has given the people the impression that this administration will be progressive, inclusive, and transparent.

   Another way in which Nayib Bukele has worked on the new e-governance is the way in which he has informed about the first donations in medications and medical implements from international organizations to the health system. Again, the President has used Twitter as his preferred way of informing the people who made a donation and the amount of it in US dollars. In two days, the President informed the donation of US$52.6 million in medications and asked the Minister of Health to activate the system and transparently distribute it to the hospitals in the whole country. The Minister of Health responded immediately, activated the system, and distributed the donations, reducing bureaucracy. This has been particularly important because in the past, El Salvador has received donations but the people did not have much access to information about it or to how these donations were managed, creating opportunities for mismanagement or corruption. In fact, the ex President Francisco Flores (1999-2004) was judicially processed for having received US$15 million in help from Taiwan (help that was supposed to be directed to the victims of the 8.1 magnitude earthquake of 2001) and for having used it for a political campaign.

   Therefore, many Salvadorans are seeing as positive the fact that Nayib Bukele is using social media to inform about each step that he is taking in public administration. Given that most of the population has access to a smartphone and to internet and social networks, information can quickly flow and reach people who were not reached before. This can be seen as a good start to the promised e-governance and it is expected to be replicated within each government institution. There is a lot of work because we are talking about a system that has been based on paper and a high bureaucracy. But it is a good start.

Dr. Ana Figueroa

Saugata, B., and Masud, R.R. (2007). Implementing E-Governance Using OECD Model(Modified) and Gartner Model (Modified) Upon Agriculture of Bangladesh. IEEE. 1-4244-1551-9/07.