Abstract
This study examined the electronic readiness (e-readiness) of South African municipalities for the effective implementation of electronic government (e-Government) services, with specific reference to the City of Mbombela Local Municipality. While South Africa formally committed to integrating information and communication technology (ICT) into the public sector as early as the mid-1990s, the implementation of e-Government at the local government sphere has remained uneven and largely uncoordinated. Existing evidence indicates that numerous municipal e-Government initiatives have either stagnated or failed outright due to limited ICT skills, weak political-administrative commitment, financial constraints, and resistance to transitioning from manual to electronic systems.
Although global e-readiness assessment tools – most notably those developed by the United Nations – offer valuable benchmarks, they predominantly evaluate national government performance and inadequately account for the contextual realities of the local sphere of government in South Africa, which consists of 257 municipalities. This study responds to this gap by investigating municipal e-readiness through an integrated theoretical lens drawing on stakeholder theory, public value theory, the Technology Acceptance Model (TAM), and the Unified Theory of Acceptance and Use of Technology (UTAUT). These frameworks collectively enabled an examination of organisational, technological, and behavioural determinants influencing the adoption and use of e-Government services.
A mixed-methods research design was employed. Qualitative data were generated through focus group interviews with 5 purposively selected senior officials, 95 questionnaires were distributed among municipal officials, of which 83 were returned and analysed using the Statistical Package for the Social Sciences (SPSS). Qualitative data were analysed using Reflexive Thematic Analysis. The findings revealed that the City of Mbombela demonstrates an intermediate level of e-readiness (maturity level 2), characterised by an overreliance on outsourced ICT services, limited internal ICT capacity, and insufficient institutional preparedness. While officials exhibited a generally...