Lagos launches first online platform to interact with citizens

The Lagos State Government, on Thursday, launched a mobile app to facilitate interaction and provision of services between government and the citizens from the comfort of their homes and offices without necessarily paying a visit to government establishments where such services are being provided.
The mobile app, otherwise known as Citizens Gate under the Citizens Relations Management (CRM) initiative, is the first of its kind in Nigeria, and would avail residents of the State the opportunity to make enquiry and suggestions on government services and getting faster responses.
Addressing a joint press briefing at the Bagauda Kaltho Press Centre in Alausa, the State’s Commissioner for Science and Technology, Mr. Olufemi Odubiyi, said the launch of the web platform was another initiative of the Governor Akinwunmi Ambode-led administration aimed at bringing government closer to the people.
Odubiyi, who addressed the briefing alongside the Commissioner for Information and Strategy, Mr. Steve Ayorinde and the Director General of Lagos State Office of Transformation, Creativity and Innovation, Mr. Toba Otusanya, described the Citizens Gate as an intuitive-based technology innovation designed to manage relationship between the citizens and government.
He said: “The Citizens Gate is an integrated web and mobile-based platform through which Lagos State’s citizens can lodge feedback to the State Government on various services provided, receive quick responses on services as well as interact with government officials via web and mobile phone.
“The platform is designed to promote communication and connectivity between citizens and government while it will also enable citizens to inform the government on problems and issues occurring in their areas, communities and beyond.”
The Commissioner added that the platform would also afford citizens the opportunity to enquire about government services while also providing an avenue to make suggestions on government services for better confidence and trust in the present administration led by Governor Ambode.
According to Odubiyi, the platform can be accessed via citizensgate.lagosstate.gov.ng and a downloadable mobile app from Google play store and Apple store both on Android and iOS, while the platform would enable government to acknowledge problems and issues which would be investigated, worked on and resolved efficiently and timely.
He said apart from the fact that the development would improve the State budget thus making planning a lot easier and preventing waste and encouraging savings that will aid in provision of more services and development, the platform would further help government to determine which programme of the State is working and whether to replace or improve on any programme for efficient and effective service delivery to the people.  
In his remarks, Otusanya said the platform has been designed initially to accommodate 22 MDAs of government and same will be scaled up to cover all MDAs in the near future.
He said government officials have been trained to be in charge of the platform in all the initial MDAs, while citizens with no access to internet can call the Command Centre on 767 and a ticket will be issued instantly on their behalf.