By Ling Hui
KUCHING, March 9: Sarawak Premier Datuk Patinggi Tan Sri Abang Johari Tun Openg wants Sarawak government-linked companies (GLCs) and statutory bodies to emulate the Open Network Enterprises (One) successes of European countries.
He said Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania are global forerunners when it comes to digitalisation, and Sarawak should learn from them.
“…5G networks, comprehensive broadband coverage, and extended online administration services characterise the Baltic States as much as a successful start-up and tech scene, which has brought forth companies such as Skype, Transferwise, Trafi, Taxify, and Starship Technologies.
“The Baltic countries are ideal test labs for eGovernment, IT security, blockchain, and many more digital developments, which are likely to shape our world in the near and far future.
“We must continue to emulate and adopt these digital transformation projects in order to achieve competitive advantages,” he said during his speech at the closing ceremony of the Digital Leadership Forum in Kuala Lumpur today.
Abang Johari also urged the Sarawak Financial Secretary Office to pioneer and spearhead digital transformation initiatives for other GLCs and statutory bodies in Sarawak.
He wanted the State Financial Secretary Office to collaborate with Sarawak Centre of Performance Excellence (Scope) as the secretariat to facilitate, conduct more capacity-building programmes and digital corporate summits.
“These forums and programmes not only provide an excellent opportunity to identify best practices and create leads but most importantly, also create space for direct networking, knowledge transfer and matchmaking discussions.
“To thrive in times of the digital age and pandemic, no one organisation can survive alone and as such new business models of co-creation, agility and smart partnerships is the way forward,” he said.
In a recap of Sarawak’s own digital transformation journey over the past five years, Abang Johari said the State has embarked on several catalytic initiatives.
To further enhance data-driven economic growth, he added, the State government will continue to develop and enhance policies for public and private sector data access, a data centre that will meet the data hosting requirements, government open data platform, big data and data analytics platforms for data analysis, research, innovation and commercialisation, of which will be addressed as part of the Digital Economy Strategy 2030.
With that, he urged GLCs and statutory bodies to adopt a “business unusual” mission and vision which encourages the usage of different tools to address the unique challenges of each business while bringing about the desired social-economic impact and driving organisational success in the future.
“In short, we may need to let go of things which made us successful in the past in order to make room for new skills, partnerships, ways of working and untapped opportunities,” he said.
Abang Johari’s speech text was read out by Deputy Premier Datuk Amar Douglas Uggah Embas as the former was unable to attend the ceremony in person due to a recent Covid-19 infection.
Among other dignitaries present were Sarawak Financial Secretary Dato Sri Wan Lizozman Wan Omar, Sarawak Attorney General Dato Sri Talat Mahmood Abdul Rashid, Scope chairwoman and Sarawak Deputy State Secretary (Performance and Service Delivery Transformation) Datu Dr Sabariah Putit. — DayakDaily
