Cost Communication Time Current State of M-Government for Participation

72 convenience, cost, communication, time, participation in decision making, and personalisation.

5.4.1 Convenience

The convenience of m-government allows citizens to report problemsaspirations anywhere and anytime. Due to the fact that Indonesia’s geographic characteristics offer access gap particularly in rural areas Harijadi Satriya 2000, this benefit is indeed in accordance with what is expected from m-government as a new channel of e- government in Indonesia. This is also justified by several researchers Khuschu Kuscu 2003; Sharma Gupta 2004; Casalo et al. 2007 saying that the main objective of m-government is to enable citizens to access public information and services whenever and wherever they might be. It can facilitate more e-government adoption through the convenient accessibility and availability offered by its mobile value Nava Dávila 2005; Khuschu et al. 2007.

5.4.2 Cost

According to citizens, there is cost reductions resulted from using m-government service, both via SMS or mobile application, to connect with public officials and governmental activities. Cost saving is indeed benefit expected by LAPOR team to increase LAPOR adoption and to improve their participation in controlling government development programs and public services with consideration of those in rural areas. Besides the cost savings caused by cheaper mobile phone’s price compare to other electronic device, for example computer, cost saving is also resulted from minimised SMS ’ rate due to internal SMS gateway provision which generates 87.5 cost saving per SMS compare to rate from content provider. There are also other cost savings since, for example, citizens no longer need to go directly to government or make a phone call whose rate is higher than SMS’ or even internet’s rates. This benefit is also justified by some researchers mentioned in section 2.2.2 and deemed as one of most significant benefit Gilbert et al. 2004.

5.4.3 Communication

Communication benefit has the third highest score, particularly for providing efficient communication channel to government. It is beneficial particularly for those in rural 73 areas who find it difficult to communicate with government. This efficiency might be related to cost and time saving benefitted from the adoption of m-government. Referring to m-government success assessment, it can be assumed that the communication benefit probably also related to the good system quality, particularly because m-government system is easy and friendly to use so citizens find it efficient to communicate with government. This result is also supported by Kushchu et al. 2007 that m-government can facilitate andor improve government-citizens relationship.

5.4.4 Time

The findings also show that there is citizens’ perceived benefit in terms of time. Even though there might be no considerable benefit in term of quicker response time, m- government still provides time saving when interacting with government and enables citizens to avoid direct dealing with public officials, particularly for those in rural areas where access to government is quite difficult. It is also confirmed by several researchers Sharma Gupta 2004; Kushchu et al. 2007 who suggest that m-government allows smooth transactions without face-to-face interaction so the time needed could be reduced. Time savings and interaction avoidance are considered two of most compelling benefit of e-government, and so m-government Gilbert et al. 2004.

5.4.5 Participation in Decision Making