Known as a staunch advocate for the development of information and communication technology (ICT) in the countryside, she completes the eight awardees in this prestigious recognition for women not more than 45 years old given by the TOWNS Foundation every three years.
Batapa-Sigue led stakeholders in Bacolod to come together as councilor and chair of the Sanggunian Committee on Communications in 2004 to promote Bacolod as a destination for ICT-enabled jobs and investments. She chaired the Bacolod IT Focus Team, which worked together on strategies and programs to develop Bacolod City and Negros Occidental as one the growing centers of innovation in the country.
She is the founder of a confederation of government, academe and business and private sector known as the Bacolod-Negros Occidental Federation for Information and Communication Technology (BNEFIT) in 2007. BNEFIT eventually joined similar bodies existing in other cities and provinces to create in 2008, the National ICT Confederation of the Philippines (NICP) now composed of more than 50 ICT councils nationwide. She served as NICP President from 2010-2012 and continues to be a trustee to this day.
During her presidency, she actively organized along with the Department of Interior and Local Government (DILG) and CyberCity Philippines the annual Awards for Excellence in ICT for Good Governance for Local Government Units (eGov Awards).
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| TOWNS Awardee Atty. Jocelle Batapa-Sigue and family |
Bacolod today is in the global map as the 85th City in the Tholons International Top 100 Cities in the world and currently the latest Center of Excellence for IT-BPM in the Philippines. Bacolod was recently honored in the International ICT Summit Flare Awards as “beacon” for all other cities in ICT investment programs.
Because of her exemplary dedication as an ICT champion, she was chosen as Asia Society Top Ten Philippines 21 Fellow in 2009 and Eisenhower Fellow of the Philippines for 2012. She was awarded last March 2014 as Philippine Individual Contributor of the Year during the International ICT Awards given by the Canadian Chamber of Commerce and Industry in the Philippines.
She served for 3 terms as councilor of Bacolod, and volunteer consultant to the Province of Negros Occidental for ICT Investments, where she assists in developing the Negros First CyberCentre and the first Technology Business Incubator (TBI) for tech startups in the province. She currently leads the Visayas ICT Cluster Organization (VICTOR). She is also a professor of law at the University of St. La Salle-Bacolod.
She is a resource speaker of the Department for Information and Communications Technology (DICT) for Cybercrimes, Cyber-Bullying, Cyber-Trafficking and Capacity development for ICT Councils. She currently helps in managing the Technology Business Incubation Center located at the Negros First CyberCentre in Bacolod City.
Source: JBS
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