E-government: Who controls the controllers?

Asks Kayode Akinmade in the Nigerian Tribune

THE promise of e-government is a transparent, accessible, efficient state in a new partnership with its citizens. But could it be the model of an invisible model of political control? .... It may sound like a brave new world. But the concept of e-government does not signify only efficiency, gains and economic benefits, it also underpins the changing, thickening relationship between government and power in the new era of integrated computer networks. More precisely, in an advanced technological society whose social structure is the result of the interaction among a complex web of networks constantly exchanging and processing data between their myriad of nodal points, the exercise of power and the relationships of power are radically changed.