Tarlac, Cebu City top 1st Robredo ICT Awards

CLARK FREEPORT, Pampanga, Philippines – The provincial government of Tarlac and the local government of Cebu City have won the first Jesse Robredo Awards for Excellence in ICT for Good Governance.

Initially known as the eGov Awards before the plane crash that claimed the life of Interior and Local Government Secretary Robredo, the search seeks to promote seek good governance among local government units (LGUs) through the use of modern information and communications technology (ICT).

CyberCity president George Sorio announced here yesterday the LGU awardees in the nationwide competition under two categories: the Tarlac provincial government under the government-to-business (G2B) category, and Cebu City under the government-to-customer (G2C) category.

G2B covers the use of ICT to facilitate business transactions of LGUs, while G2C refers to the use of ICT to ease the public’s transactions with LGUs, according to Sorio.

In the G2C category, Naga City was second placer, and Iloilo City, the third placer. Under the G2C category, Balanga City in Bataan was second, and Carmona, Cavite was third.

The awarding rites were held over the weekend in Sta. Rosa, Laguna.

The award was named after Robredo who, while he was still head of the Department of the Interior and Local Governments, fully supported it as a means to advance transparency in governance.

The search was initiated earlier this year under a memorandum of agreement (MOA) between Robredo and the National ICT Confederation of the Philippines and Cyber City Teleservices Philippines Inc. based in this freeport.

Under the MOA, the awards would establish a “strategic approach to stimulate the country’s good governance initiatives to enable LGUs to become catalyst of change and index model of development anchored in the Philippine Digital Strategy (PDS) 2011-2016 which foresees the emergence of intelligent enabled-cities with full access to information and services anytime, anywhere.”