Title: Evaluation of accessibility standards on Ugandan e-government websites

Authors: Joyce Nakatumba-Nabende; Benjamin Kanagwa; Florence Nameere Kivunike; Michael Tuape

Addresses: School of Computing and Informatics Technology, Makerere University, Kampala, Uganda ' School of Computing and Informatics Technology, Makerere University, Kampala, Uganda ' School of Computing and Informatics Technology, Makerere University, Kampala, Uganda ' School of Computing and Informatics Technology, Makerere University, Kampala, Uganda

Abstract: In spite of the efforts made by the Government of Uganda through the National IT Authority Uganda (NITA-U) to provide many of the government services online, web accessibility is still not considered as a major factor by the developers of the e-government websites. As a result, people with disabilities cannot use websites as effectively as people without disabilities. Therefore, the main objective of this study was to evaluate the extent by which Ugandan e-government websites meet the internationally accepted WCAG 2.0 standards. The analysis was done for 63 websites belonging to government ministries, departments and agencies. Website accessibility assessment was carried out using two automatic evaluation tools: TAW and AChecker. The results presented in this paper indicate that all the websites not do not satisfy the level AA accessibility guidelines. Although NITA-U has developed guidelines for building websites, there is still great need to improve accessibility on e-government websites.

Keywords: accessibility; e-government; WCAG 2.0; ministries; departments and agencies; MDAs; developing country; Uganda.

DOI: 10.1504/EG.2019.102615

Electronic Government, an International Journal, 2019 Vol.15 No.4, pp.355 - 371

Received: 15 Nov 2017
Accepted: 28 Aug 2018
Published online: 30 Sep 2019 *

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