home Africa, Internet, Technology Dr. Bitange Ndemo the Kenyan ICT Permanent Secretary leads an IT revolution

Dr. Bitange Ndemo the Kenyan ICT Permanent Secretary leads an IT revolution

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A recent article I read by LosAngeles times, California USA, celebrated PS Ndemo’s  achievements in Internet Revolution in Africa:

 “Since Bitange Ndemo got Kenya hooked up to high-speed Internet, there has been no stopping his cyber-progress. A ‘Silicon Savannah’ is now flourishing”

Kenya is known as a powerhouse in Africa for many developments in the agriculture, health, business and entrepreneurship. The most striking of all the achievements of the country is the Internet technology.  Kenya is one of the most connected countries with fiber optic technology and currently boasts of four undersea cables that link it to the rest of the world.  Kenya also is the home of Mpesa the mobile money platform that has revolutionized money transfer. Nearly 90% of the population has access to cell phones, according to the Government Communications Commission of Kenya CCK.

These developments in the ICT sector have come partly because of an able Permanent secretary Dr. Bitange Ndemo who since joining the ministry in 2005 has under his helm presided over some top notch developments .  Having studied in the USA, the 52-year-old head of the Ministry of Information and Communications Technology is at the heart of Kenya’s startling IT revolution.

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Information PS Dr-Bitange-Ndemo (Image: ItSMF International)

He is appreciated among his peers as well as players in the country with some of the industry stakeholders like the Kenyan innovation hub  Ihub’s founder Hersman quoted saying “We are in that phase where the government is fully on board with the tech revolution that is happening, but also the people, normal citizens, are really embracing change,” …”I have to give it to [Ndemo]. That guy, over the past five years has really pushed things along, and other people — regulatory bodies and the government itself — have seen this and gone with him on it.”

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Among other firsts that could possibly put Kenya in a new platform as the undisputed home of innovation is the upcoming African Registry for the .africa.  The .africa gTLD is one among the 17 new gTLD’s that have been applied for in the new ICANN dispensation and is expected to be delegated probably 2013.

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Sophia Bekele speaking with PS. Bitange Ndemo

on .africa launch in Nairobi

DotConnectAfrica  had been given the credit for introducing the .africa GTLD at ICANN and Africa  and raising the profile of .africa gTLD globally. DCA has also pledged to ensure that a world class registry will be set up in Kenya and its proceeds will be used equally to advance technology in Africa among other programs like generation.africa and Miss DotAfrica. Announcing this good news in a recent press release, DotConnectAfrica CEO Ms. Bekele said  “From the geographical point of view, no country compares to Kenya in terms of accessibility to the five (5) sub-regions of Africa, and its membership of the Common Market for East and Southern Africa (COMESA) also provides further distinctive advantages in terms of market access and coverage.”

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DotConnectAfrica said it will work with other organizations like Safaricom who are the best telecommunication company and also the proprietor of the Mpesa mobile money service, other companies include the UK based world class registry provider CentralNic , and Fincom a leading one stop Kenyan based IT firm incorporated in 2003.

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Kenya is therefore growing rapidly with more and more blue chip companies looking to set up their regional offices. Companies like IBM have invested a huge amount of billions to set up its first research center in Africa.

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With the increasing number of incubation hubs to cater for the increasing innovative y- generation who are creating colossal number of African based mobile applications like icow a virtual veterinary among several others these developments will be assured continually under the watch of innovative leaders like Dr. Ndemo.

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Link to LA Times article here:  http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/world/la-fg-kenya-tech-20121115,0,4319694.story

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James Barnley

I’m the editor of the DomainingAfrica. I write about internet and social media, focusing mainly on Domains. As a subscriber to my newsletter, you’ll get a lot of information on Domain Issues, ICANN, new gtld’s, Mobile technology and social media.

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