Be active online

They tried to look at the problems of covering the activities of civil servants from different angles during a round table dedicated to the implementation of the “Hearing State” concept. We explained to its participants, connected from the districts via video link, the main goals of the preliminary analytical work and the opportunity to exchange accumulated experience.

– Our common task is to bring to life the concept of a “Hearing State”, which promptly and effectively responds to all constructive requests from citizens. Only through constant dialogue can authorities and society build a harmonious state, embedded in the context of modern geopolitics. Therefore, it is necessary to support and strengthen civil society, to involve it in the discussion of the most pressing national problems in order to solve them,” recalled the head of the regional department for civil service affairs, Adilbek Mukashev, in a quote from the annual Address of the Head of State. He moderated an important event.

No place for compliments

“Official Internet resources of all twelve districts and two subsites of Aktobe districts, as well as official pages and personal pages of district and city akims on social networks Facebook and Instagram were subject to monitoring,” the department’s press secretary explained to the round table participants Anar Tanerbergenova.

Five evaluation criteria were used for the analysis: correct maintenance of official websites (subsites) of government agencies; activity in maintaining pages on social networks; active consideration of citizens’ questions received on social networks; presence of a press secretary/press service; interaction between government agencies and regional newspapers. This took into account the availability of useful information on the sites, ease of use of the Internet resource, availability of contact information and good feedback from the population.

As noted, in general, the legislation on access to information in terms of the content of the government agency’s Internet resource is being implemented: there are tabs with information about the region, the latest news, contact information and information about management. However, they are not entirely thought out; slides or press releases are displayed instead of current local news. In this case, if there is no information to fill, publications from regional newspapers should be used, which will increase reader coverage, the department believes.

The attention of the round table participants was also drawn to the fact that the information posted on Internet resources is difficult to find. There is no unified system for structuring and format of posted files for downloading.

– We propose to reconsider the format of the information feed, to include not only compliments, but also the problems of the area, proposing ways to solve them. Publish clarifications, responses to complaints, suggestions and questions from citizens. When moving to the Unified Portal of Internet Resources of Government Agencies (EPIRGO), it is necessary to think about creating convenient content. A responsible approach will not only significantly improve the image of the government agency, but also establish bilateral interaction with the population,” Tanerbergenova added.

When monitoring official accounts, the emphasis was placed on regularity, the content of posts, the number of subscribers, the presence of comments and the response from the government agency, as well as its design. It is noted that posts are limited to standard publications about work trips, events and announcements. Reviews are not published, online surveys and consultations of citizens are rare, although social networks make it possible to quickly resolve many issues, eliminating bureaucracy and the need to visit an organization, thereby relieving the work of the state apparatus. The low number of subscribers proves the ineffective use of this opportunity by akimats. On a local scale, the official pages of the Martuk and Mugalzhar districts are worthy of emulation, where social network tools are actively and correctly used.

Akims of Aktobe and ten of the twelve districts created personal pages on Facebook and Instagram. But here you can more often see congratulatory posts, or posts of a notification and informational nature. In terms of the number of interesting posts, subscribers, and there are more than six thousand of them, and positive comments, the leader of the Temir region is Zholdas Kalmaganbetov. He promptly responds to citizen complaints, listens to suggestions and gives comprehensive answers to comments. Among those for whom information work on social networks is not a priority are the akims of the Shalkar and Mugalzhar districts, and the akim of the Almaty district of Aktobe.

New version of “district”

The main tool for feedback with the population in the district remains the district newspaper, each of them has official pages on the social networks Vkontakte, Facebook and Instagram. Going out once a week makes it difficult to inform the local population in a timely manner about important events taking place in the area and beyond. The solution to this problem is to create an electronic version of newspapers. Editorial offices in the Mugalzhar, Uil, Khobdin and Shalkar districts took this step. The lack of websites for other newspapers is due to insufficient funding or fear of a reduction in subscribers to the paper version of the publication.

– We recommend that district akimats consider creating an electronic version of district newspapers, or with the transfer of government agencies to EPIRGO, consider the possibility of transferring akimats’ Internet resources into the ownership of district editorial offices to expand the specific capabilities of the district press, taking into account all the above problems. The monitoring also showed that now newspapers do not cover even a third of the population of the districts, the main speaker expressed her opinion.

The availability of specialists who are entrusted with the functions of conducting information work on websites, social networks and the media was also analyzed. It turned out that these are available only in the akimats of the city and region. In the districts, the duties of press secretaries are assigned to specialists from the internal policy department, the youth resource center, the akims’ office, the personnel service, or freelance specialists are involved.

At the end of last year, the Department of Civil Service Affairs sent letters to the offices of district akims about the need to create a separate staffing position for a press secretary. The recommendation was heeded in the Aitekebi, Baiganinsky and Irgiz districts. In the Kargaly region, two freelancers are saving the situation. In seven districts, the functions of the press secretary were assigned to akimat employees and they promised to resolve the issue by the end of this year. In the Mugalzhar district, the press secretary is essentially the head of the internal policy department.

– The presence of authorized specialists in interaction with the media is an indicator of openness and well-established feedback from society, which is one of the main criteria for the work of government bodies. Considering the planned reduction in the ranks of civil servants, we recommend that district akimats, if necessary, work on the issue of attracting freelance specialists to work on interaction with the media, advised Adilbek Mukashev.

Achieve openness

“Certain circumstances led to the result we have,” stated Sergei Bekker, head of the regional department of informatization and external relations.

He dwelled in detail on the topic of transition to the Unified Portal of Internet Resources of Government Bodies. In his opinion, the idea of ​​concentrating on one site is a good one. The only problem is that 85-87 percent of users come from mobile devices, so the text they want to see should look a little different. He also drew attention to the fact that often funding for work with sites occurs on a residual basis; inexperienced and sometimes random people are involved in the work.

– There is a young man, preferably a trainee. The head of the apparatus tells him, you are a programmer, and entrusts him with filling the site. But systematic work is not being carried out. The population needs services. Accordingly, emphasis should be placed on electronic services. People want interactive services; they want to immediately receive the necessary, reliable information. For example, where are the traffic jams, where is the road being built, where is it blocked. The work must be structured in such a way that you can provide the population with service and information. The position and policy regarding the release of information must be changed and not be closed,” Sergei Bekker shared with the round table participants.

Journalists, district akims, and those who directly work on social networks also shared their wishes. As noted, the Department of Civil Service Affairs will purposefully continue to work in the direction that is relevant today.