NSPA shifts five services to government’s oneGov digital platform

Five services offered by the National Social Protection Agency (NSPA) have been moved to the government’s digital services platform, oneGov, with more to follow.

Speaking at a ceremony held at the Maldives Innovation and Digital Company (Mindco), which operates oneGov, NSPA’s CEO, Heena Waleed, said the shift marked the first step in a broader digital transformation of the agency’s work.

“In the future, more services will be digitized and made easier to access,” she said.

Services now available on oneGov:

Heena said applications for these services can still be submitted directly to NSPA using physical forms, but the services will move permanently to the oneGov system from January after awareness campaigns. More NSPA services are expected to transition soon, she said.

She said the changes were part of President Dr Mohamed Muizzu’s “Maldives 2.0” agenda, which aims to reduce paper-based processes and strengthen service delivery.

Providing support to vulnerable people currently involves extensive manual processing, she said, creating difficulties for both staff and those seeking the service.

“When I took over, I was concerned about how the employees were working,” she said.

Digitizing services would make the process “transparent and easy”, while easing staff workload.

Mindco’s managing director, Saeeda Umar, said oneGov currently hosts mainly business-related services, making NSPA’s inclusion particularly significant. She described the wider digitalization agenda as beneficial, though noted that the biggest challenge was helping agencies adapt their work to the platform.

She said the goal was to digitise all government institutions by 2027.

Six more agencies will join oneGov this year, bringing the total to 50 agencies offering around 360 services, with more expected to be added as the system expands.