The Anti-Red Tape Authority (ARTA) expects to onboard 30 more government agencies this year in its updated information system – Anti-Red Tape Electronic Management Information System (ARTEMIS) – on heightened efforts to facilitate the submission of Citizen’s Charters (CCs) and further improve transparency in government processes.
ARTA Secretary Ernesto V. Perez said they target to onboard 30 more agencies this year from 48 priority agencies last year. The deadline for encoding of batch 1 was on April 30, while batches 2 and 3 are expected to upload their Citizen’s Charter by May 30, and batches 4 and 5 by June 30.
As a web-based system and communication tool, ARTEMIS provides real-time, on-demand access to a comprehensive database of CCs and mapping of government services to ensure efficient service, improved transparency, and easier report tracking.
It serves as a centralized system for encoding, submitting, uploading, and editing CCs across government agencies, while also functioning as an efficient monitoring and evaluating mechanism of CCs for ARTA.
It also includes the addition of calendar days in the processing time for each step, the printing and generation of CCs and enhanced features for updating service information.
These proposed enhancements include the development of standardized service templates for local government units and the encoding of services involving multiple stages of processing.
The ARTEMIS was fully developed by ARTA with technical assistance from USAID and UP Public Administration Research and Extension Foundation, hence, no financial costs to the Philippine government.
ARTEMIS is one of ARTA’s initiatives to ensure that government entities comply with Republic Act No. 11032, or the Ease of Doing Business Act, particularly with the Citizen’s Charter submission. It is also envisioned to be a repository of all compliances in the future as it will be further developed and customized.
Even before ARTEMIS was developed ARTA has been actively helping government agencies update their CC or draft the CC should the agency still has none. RA11032 specifically requires the Citizens Charter be put up in all government agencies providing services.
To date, Perez said that ARTA’s database on Citizens Charter submission is at 95 percent already of its covered agencies, and this leaves about 5 percent that the Authority is trying to assist in putting up their Citizens Charter. Most of these government offices are in the regions.
Under ARTA Memorandum Circular 2019-002, all government agencies were given up to December 6, 2019 to submit their CC. Thereafter, agencies are required to update their submitted Citizens Charter whenever there are changes in their services, process, requirements, or fees to be paid.
However, some agencies find it difficult to transition from the perspective of providing services by department/division to the perspective of end-to-end service which is what should be reflected in their Citizens Charter. Another reason is the change of agency Committee on Anti- Red Tape composition.
