66.5 % of the respondents of the government portal prefer emails as means of communication

Abu Dhabi: A total of 66.5 per cent of users of the official portal of the UAE Government prefer email to other means of communication with government authorities, a Telecommunications Regulatory Authority (TRA) online opinion poll shows.

Salem Khamis Al Shair Al Suwaidi, Deputy Director General for Information and e-Government Sector at TRA, said: “More than 2,100 people participated in the poll. Of these, 14 per cent prefer to visit the entity to complete their transactions, 12 per cent prefer to communicate through SMS, while only around 6 per cent prefer social media tools such as Facebook, Twitter, discussion forums and similar channels.”

Al Suwaidi added: “The poll represents portal users’ views,” noting that many people have reservations about using social media to contact the government especially when it comes to sharing personal data and transactions due to the lack of privacy on such tools compared to emails.

Al Suwaidi stressed that it is necessary that government entities communicate with the public using all available channels including social media channels such as Facebook and Twitter.

“Social media tools are new channels to communicate with the public, which should be added to the list of conventional channels of communication with the public,” Al Suwaidi said.