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Mission

To maintain and uphold the rule of law for the country's stability and prosperity.
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Information and Communication Technology Unit (ICT Unit) PDF Print E-mail

Brief History

Beginning

Before the ICT Unit was established in 2002, Attorney Generals’ Chambers, with the support of the Government Printers Department embarked on a joint project known as BruLaw which was responsible for the reproduction of all revised Laws of Brunei. 

The Unit was established to be in line with Brunei Darussalam’s e-Government policies.  With its establishment, the Attorney General’s Chambers has invested in the effective use of IT equipments with the concept of shared network system for ease of doing work.  Initially, the Unit had invested on E-Speed as the source of internet and intranet connection for the benefits of its users in the Attorney General’s Chambers. E-Speed was eventually replaced in 2005 by PMO-Net IT Network Infrastructure.


Developments over the years

In 2005 the PMO-Net IT Network Infrastructure was established. This was to serve Attorney General’s Chambers’ inter and intra-network connection. With its introduction, every officers and staff of AGC were given e-mail addresses for mailing purposes and to enable instant messaging (chat) between PMO-Net users. This was a milestone for the Unit and has had a great impact on the officers and staffs work as a whole as they have become dependent upon computers, e-mail and the internet. 

In 2006, the Registries Division embarked on the use of information technology to help the Registry in their system, initiated by the Registry of Business Names, which later adopted by the Registry of Companies and Registry of Trade Marks in 2007. This initiative is called the Electronic Registry System (e-Registry).

The e-Registry System has made registration of companies, business names and trademarks faster, more efficient and easily accessible to its users. It has vastly improved the process workflow and has successfully integrated 3 major registries components into one system.


E-Library

The introduction of online legal resources has become apparent in most legal  institutions. The Attorney General’s Chambers has had subscriptions to resources namely LawNet Singapore (2007), LawNet Malaysia (2007) and LexisNexis (2005). LawNet Singapore is an online legal resource allowing searches to different types of legal content providing an efficient and comprehensive research of case laws such as in Singapore and Malaysia, legal materials, Singapore’s legislation, parliamentary reports and treaties. The LawNet Malaysia similarly is an online library consisting of authoritative text of the laws of Malaysia. LexisNexis on the other hand boasts a wider range of legal contents internationally for example from the UK and other common law countries.  

The Attorney General’s Chambers has started to publish its laws online. This was done to make laws of Brunei more accessible to the public. It was initially integrated in 2007 through the Library Unit within the Attorney General’s Chambers’ intranet content by archiving digital documents (in pdf format) for internal references.  In 2009, the documents are were made available to the public as a legal resource including government gazettes and laws of Brunei Darussalam which can be found in http://www.agc.gov.bn


Today

The Unit is currently headed by Awg Hj Md Zulfakhrur Razi bin Hj Omar Ali, System Analyst, Awg Hj Sahif bin Hj Rashid, Photo-typesetter Operator Grade 3, Dyg Sharifah Sarimah binti Wan Ibrahim, Photo-typesetter Operator Grade 3, and Awg Ahmad bin Hj Abdul Wahab, Clerk. The Unit is responsible for developing plans for the effective use of IT equipment and facilities, installation, maintenance and repair, distribution of IT equipments, network configuration, updating of Attorney General’s Chambers’ internet and intranet website as well as handling queries regarding IT issues.


Future Developments

The E-Registry System will play a major big role in E-Government Technical Body Authority (EGTAB) initiative called the Business Hub. The project will involve government agencies  where Attorney General’s Chambers’ Registries Division will be the main business information source through the E-Registry System.

In order to improve the Attorney General’s Chambers’ current laws online would ideally be to have an extensive legal resource in order to be on-par with neighboring countries’ E-Library such as the LawNet and LexisNexis.  For example to include information if Brunei Darussalam’s judicial decisions or text of agreements to which Brunei Darussalam is a party to. 

The Unit has made a  significant contribution as the ICT facilitator in the Attorney General’s Chambers and will continue contributing its services to assist, give solution and recommendation for the benefits of the Chambers.
Last Updated on Wednesday, 24 March 2010 03:29