Election Data Openness (ID0098)

January 2019 - December 2020
Commitment Description
Lead implementing
agency/actor
National Election Commission (NEC)
Indonesia is known as one of the biggest democratic
countries where everyone has the right to elect their
representative and the head of each government
level. There are two types of election which are the
national and regional election. The election
implementation is mandated to the National Election
Commission (NEC). Regarding the important role of
NEC, it has some innovation in executing its duties.
For instance, it publishes electoral data in
http://infopemilu.kpu.go.id portal. However, the data in
the portal is not completely available and limited only
in recent years.
Furthermore, it also occurs for the information about
legislative candidates profile, president candidates
profile and recapitulation of vote counting. That
information can be access in the various web portal,
such as http://infopemilu.kpu.go.id and
https://www.kpu.go.id/. Therefore, to encourage
transparency in the election process, NEC have to
integrate the data through open access.
What is the public problem that
the commitment will address?
The development of integrated electoral data with One
Data aims to adopt the principle of One Data which are
accessible, reusable, and able to be re-distributed by
everyone. The data could be downloaded in an open
format (e.g: CSV, XLS, XML, JSON). In result, the One
Data principles facilitate people to access government
data. The commitment also encourages publishing the
vote counting result, legislative and executive
candidates profile in one NEC official portal. So that,
the people can find the information easily.
What is the commitment?
27 Indonesia Open Government Partnership National Action Plan 2018-2020
To solve the problems above, the commitments tries to
simplify the access of data and information regarding
the election process. Moreover, this commitment is
addressed in two areas which are implementing the
principles of One Data and publishing the vote
counting result.
Therefore, the accessible data will enhance the
transparency of election process both in national and
regional. The development of the electronic system will
also ensure the accuracy, security, and trust of the
people as well as reduce the possibility of fraud during
the election.
How will the commitment
contribute to solve the public
problem? The commitment shows transparency which is one of
the values of Open Government Partnership (OGP). It
is related to the openness quality of public information
and people access the information. In this case,
transparency is shown by integrating the election data
into One Data Portal Indonesia that can facilitate
people to access its data to create a better and more
reliable election.
Why is this commitment relevant
to OGP values?
The commitment is also aligned with achievement
effort of Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs)
Number 16: “Promote peaceful and inclusive societies
for sustainable development, provide access to justice
for all and effective, accountable and inclusive
institution at all levels”, especially on target 16.6:
“Develop effective, accountable and transparent
institutions at all levels”. Because this commitment is
expected to realize the openness in the national and
regional election in Indonesia, then the integrated
election data can support sustainable development in
the country. Milestone Activity with a verifiable
deliverable
Start Date: End Date:
1. Publication of data on National
Election 2019 voting results at
polling stations online at the official
NEC portal
April 2019 December 2019
2. Integration of data election at one
official NEC portal. This means that
the integration of two portals
(http://infopemilu.kpu.go.id and
https://www.kpu.go.id/) to provide
one portal for election data.
January 2019 December 2019
Contact information
Other Actors
Involved
State actors
involved
1. Ministry of Home Affairs
2. Ministry of National Development and Planning
3. Election Supervisory Body
CSOs, private
sector, multilaterals,
working groups
Association for Election and Democracy (Perludem)
28
3. Publication of data on Regional
Election 2020 voting results at
polling stations online at the official
NEC portal
September 2020 December 2020
Indonesia Open Government Partnership National Action Plan 2018-2020
4. The availability of data election
information in One Data Portal
June 2019 December 2020

7. Data Integration to Increase Openness in the Management of National Election and Regional Election

Language of the commitment as it appears in the action plan:

The development of integrated electoral data with One Data aims to adopt the principle of One Data which are accessible, reusable, and able to be re-distributed by everyone. The data could be downloaded in an open format (e.g. CSV, XLS, XML, JSON). In result, the One Data principles facilitate people to access government data. The commitment also encourages publishing the vote counting result, legislative and executive candidates profile in one NEC official portal. So that, the people can find the information easily.

Milestones:

1. Publication of data on National Election 2019 voting results at polling stations online at the official NEC portal.
2. Integration of data election at one official NEC portal. This means that the integration of two portals (kpu.go.id and kpu.go.id) to provide one portal for election data.
3. Publication of data on Regional Election 2020 voting results at polling stations online at the official NEC portal.
4. The availability of data election information in One Data Portal.

Start Date: January 2019                                                               End Date: December 2020

Context and Objectives

General elections in Indonesia include the elections of the president and vice president, members of the House of Representatives (DPR), the Regional Representative Council (DPD), as well as Local Peoples Representative Council (DPRD) at the provincial and city and regency levels. In addition, each province, city, and regency across the country also conducts Local Elections (Pilkada) where voters vote for governor, mayor, or regent in accordance with their voter registration.

The General Elections Commission (KPU) is responsible for organizing each of these elections with the support from local offices. As such, the KPU plays a pivotal role in safeguarding the democratic process in Indonesia by ensuring fair and open elections. In this commitment, the government aims to improve public access to elections data by integrating the existing data portals with the One Data Indonesia data.go.id portal. By integrating elections data onto the One Data portal, the government hopes to make navigation easier for citizens.

Currently, the KPU does not have a centralized elections data portal and does not have consistent data standards. Some data are available on the infopemilu.kpu.go.id portal, while some datasets are available on the kpu.go.id portal. For example, voters can find their voting location on both the infopemilu.kpu.go.id ^[86] and the lindungihakpilihmu.kpu.go.id ^[87]. However, only the kpu.go.id site provides voters with information on how to change their voting location. Additionally, beyond these two portals, elections data are stored across a variety of other websites.

As noted by a researcher from the Association for Elections and Democracy (Perludem), [88] the KPU stores its data on an offline server and manually updates online portals as opposed to storing data on an online server with real-time updates. This practice, according to Perludem, [89] threatens the integrity of the elections data that are publicly available as it leaves room for human errors and time gaps between the offline and online databases.

Through this commitment, the KPU aims to integrate all datasets on the two portals (infopemilu.kpu.go.id and kpu.go.id) in a centralized data portal. By doing so, the KPU improves public access to information since it allows citizens to access elections data from a single source. Additionally, a centralized portal allows the KPU to be more consistent in its data collection, disclosure, publishing, and integrity.

At the same time, Perludem noted that the KPU’s leadership has shown a strong commitment in opening up elections data. ^[90] For example, the KPU signed a memorandum of understanding with civil society organizations to disclose its application program interface (API) to allow citizens to monitor the transparency of elections. However, a transition in the KPU’s leadership has resulted in failure to disclose this API data. As a result, civil society groups have had to manually source elections data. ^[91]

Another problem with the KPU’s current elections data is the lack of data standards enforcement. Legislative candidates’ data, for example, are sourced from documents submitted by candidates themselves through the silon.kpu.go.id platform accessible only by registered legislative candidates. Consequently, data of legislative candidates on the portal vary in details and therefore cannot be used as the definitive source for information on track records, expertise, and experience that voters need in order to make informed decisions during elections process. In an interview with the IRM researcher, however, Perludem expressed concerns over the unclear data standards used in collecting and disclosing elections data. ^[92] It is also important to develop a regulation or renew Law No. 7/2017 on Elections ^[93] to mandate disclosure of elections data in accordance with the One Data Indonesia standard. This can be the entry point for the KPU to significantly improve its elections data governance to be more consistent with international open data standards: availability of data as a whole in convenient and modifiable formats, permits to reuse and redistribute data that are machine-readable, and universal access to use, reuse, and redistribute the data. [94]

Next Steps

The KPU oversees elections. To provide citizens with access to reliable and verifiable elections data, the KPU should adopt a clear data disclosure mechanism. To avoid recurring problems in making elections data accessible due to leadership transitions, the KPU also needs to institutionalize elections data disclosure through regulation. Thus, the practice would be more consistent regardless of any changes in leadership.

The KPU could also develop the consolidated portal to facilitate citizen participation via voting and monitor election results. For example, the KPU could enable voters to update their personal data, request a change in voting location, report violations of election regulation, file complaints of campaign misconduct, etc. Currently, all of these administrative procedures can only be done in person, limiting the opportunities of some citizens to participate in elections, such as the case with the lindungihakpilihmu.kpu.go.id portal which can be used to check a voter’s registration status, but requires physical visit to the nearest KPU office to file data update request. By taking these measures, the KPU could potentially remove barriers that prevent citizens from using their voting rights and increase participation in elections.

[86] General Elections Commission, “Cari Pemilih” (accessed Mar. 2019), https://infopemilu.kpu.go.id/pilpres2019/pemilih/cari-pemilih.

[87] General Elections Commission, “Lindungi Hak Pilihmu” (accessed Mar. 2019), https://lindungihakpilihmu.kpu.go.id.

[88] Maharddhika (Association for Elections and Democracy), interview by IRM researcher, 19 Mar. 2019.

[89] Ibid.

[90] Ibid.

[91] Ibid.

[92] Ibid.

[93] Government of Indonesia, "Undang-Undang No. 7/2017 tentang Pemilihan Umum" (2017), https://rumahpemilu.org/wp-content/uploads/2017/08/UU-No.7-Tahun-2017-tentang-Pemilu.pdf.

[94] Open Knowledge Foundation, “What is Open” (accessed Jun. 2020), https://okfn.org/opendata.

7. Data Integration to Increase Openness in the Management of National Election and Regional Election

Substantial:

Data on the 2019 and 2020 election voting results were published on the official National Election Commission portal. [60] The former KPU portal (https://www.kpu.go.id/) was integrated into http://infopemilu.kpu.go.id to streamline election information. However, the election and regional election administration data was not connected with One Data, which would have enabled reusability and greater accessibility in open data format. [61]