IEC snubs open source

“Free and fair” says electoral body while forcing digital citizens to adopt Microsoft’s browser technology.

As the Independent Electoral Commission (IEC) launched their 2009 campaign in Midrand promising to bring South Africa a free and fair election, their Web site contradicted that claim by locking out open source users. Currently if you go to the IEC Web site you can only access information there using a Microsoft Internet Explorer (IE) browser.

A serious oversight says top Web and technology expert and analyst Arthur Goldstuck. “The development of the IEC Web sited has been very short sighted as they are locking out a significant proportion of users. More and more people prefer Fire Fox because it is an efficient browser, and as a matter of course the IEC should develop for all mainstream browsers. What they have been doing is forcing people into a technology choice which is not what you would expect from a national organisation that champions democracy,” says Goldstuck who believes some 20% of all internet users will currently not be able to access the www.iec.org.za.

No doubt this will leave a sour taste in the mouth of the open source community, and Goldstuck agrees that the ‘lockout’ has damaged the IEC’s reputation in this technology sector. “I don’t know whether the IEC cares about the open source community, but this certainly will affect the IEC’s reputation there.”

This issue was first raised by Aslam Raffee, Chairperson of government's OSS on his blog Vulindlela (Open the path) on the 28th of July 2008. Calling the move “digital apartheid” Raffee and the Shuttleworth Foundation joined forces to petition the IEC after pointing out to them that their web presence was undemocratic, and receiving no satisfactory response. Despite knowing and acknowledging this and with the petition in hand, the IEC choice to launch their ‘free and fair’ campaign to political parties and civil organisation at Gallagher Estate this week. "There will never be political compromise, that will never and not happen in South Africa," chairperson Brigalia Bam sought to reassure South Africans while the organisation was while compromising online voting citizens by determining their technology choices or locking them out of crucial electoral information.

If you go to the site you will read: “Welcome to the IEC web site! Our server detected that you are using a browser or operating system (e.g. Netscape, Mozilla Firefox, Google Chrome etc.) which is currently incompatible with our website. The current website is only compatible with Microsoft Internet Explorer V4 (and upward) on the Windows operating system. The website is under construction in order to rectify this. We apologise for any inconvenience this may cause.” Despite petitions from the open source community it appears the IEC elected not to change this in time for their launch.