IEC to fix website

Alastair Otter

Alastair Otter is a senior journalist at MyBroadband, and focuses on software and hardware. He has a particular love for Open Source Software (OSS)...

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The South African Independent Electoral Commission will spend R3 million to fix its website following complaints from users that the site was unavailable to web browsers other than Internet Explorer.

The election body, which kicks off its national voter registration drive this coming weekend, is also expected to respond today to a human rights complaint filed against for its inaccessible website.

Libisi Maphanga, chief information officer at the IEC, says that the organisation is "well aware" of the problems with the website and the complaints from users.

Maphanga said that a "project team" had be set up to fix the problem and it was expected to have the first phase of the all-access website up and running by January 2009. A second phase was expected to add more content by April 2009, just in time for the national elections.

The project to make the website available to all users will cost around R3 million, says Maphanga. He says that because of a growing "campaign" from disgruntled citizens complaining about the website and the "disruption to our regular work" this was causing, other projects have been put on hold so that budget could be allocated to fixing the website. The IEC also applied for supplemental funding from government for the website but this was denied.  

Disruptions

Maphanga said that he receives around "20 emails a day" complaining about the website, "many of which are very rude".

The problem with the website, he says, is that it was originally developed in 1998. At the time the site was developed on Microsoft-specific technologies and now needs to be completely revamped before it can be made available to all users. He says that the current website when viewed in a non-Internet Explorer browser is "very broken" and that is "not good for the image of the organisation".

Maphanga said that the IEC couldn’t simply allow access to all users because there was a "risk that users might get the wrong information". He said that much of the content relies on old VBScripts and even, in some more advanced sections, on users having Microsoft Windows to access the site.

Growing campaign

The IEC’s woes are far from over, however, as a new campaign around the website was launched today by disgruntled citizens. The No Firefox! No Vote! campaign, founded by well-known open source advocate Karl Fischer, is urging Internet users to email or fax Maphanga to demand that the organisation make its website available to all users.

IEC Website discussion