Open Data/Citizen Navigation Portal (LR0036)

What is the public problem that the commitment will address?: Decisions can only be made in an informed way if policymakers and citizens have access to trusted, clear and accessible data. Currently, rumors and misinformation abound in Liberia because citizens do not have access to a platform that brings this information together in a way that allows for easy, free access and synthesis of relevant data.; What is the commitment?: The commitment will allow for a better understanding, collection and production of data related to policy-making in Liberia through a series of data-collection, cleaning and synthesis activities; and ongoing development of an online platform to disseminate this data.; How will the commitment contribute to solve the public problem?: These efforts will solve this problem through providing much more data to citizens in ways that are useful and usable. While internet access for Liberians can still be limited, having all of this data in one place, online, in a form that can be used, will allow for additional offline approaches to be developed.; Why is this commitment relevant to OGP values?: Open data is a critical part of open government- it allows citizens to better navigate, understand and hold governments to account.

10. Implementation and Use of an Open Data/Citizen Navigation Portal

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

"The commitment will allow for a better understanding, collection and production of data related to policy-making in Liberia through a series of data-collection, cleaning and synthesis activities; and ongoing development of an online platform to disseminate this data.

These efforts will solve this problem through providing much more data to citizens in ways that are useful and usable. While internet access for Liberians can still be limited, having all of this data in one place, online, in a form that can be used, will allow for additional offline approaches to be developed."

Milestones:

1. Conduct a prioritized audit of IT capacity and gaps within government bodies relevant to the OGP process;
2. Conduct surveys of citizens to understand exactly what data they want from government;
3. Collection of datasets from relevant ministries and conversion to machine-readable formats to make the data easy to use and repurpose;
4. As part of the platform, create geospatial portal with all concessions agreements and related shapefiles, including agriculture, mining, and timber concessions, as well as Community Forest Management Agreements. Include maps of all community and customary lands that overlap with these concessions;
5. User design and feedback process to understand how best to integrate and display data;
6. Coordinate with the Aid Management Platform to ensure all aid data is available publicly on that platform, and it is linked to the open data platform;
7. Interactive, structured community building on open data issues between key civil society organizations in Liberia and those across the continent working on open data and transparency issues including a series of video-conferences, online discussions and virtual events to share thoughts, cross-pollinate ideas and build collaborations.

Editorial Note: For the complete text of this commitment, please see Liberia's action plan at: https://www.opengovpartnership.org/documents/liberia-action-plan-2017-2019/

This commitment aimed to conduct a series of data collection, data cleaning, and data synthesis activities and support the development of the national data portal to disseminate government-held data. ^[103] It sought to address issues of disparate website appearance, quality, and storage. It also sought to streamline maintenance, optimization, and dissemination of Government of Liberia data, particularly in the context of the OGP process. ^[104]

At the time of this commitment's formulation, the national data portal was live but not formally launched. It provided links to websites of ministries and agencies and their online services and an unpopulated data repository page. ^[105] Site managers communicated with users through email. The site did not track data on general usage. ^[106]

This commitment was not started and thus not completed at the end of the action plan period. Contributing factors included the change in administration, resulting change in focus, and, later, changes in staffing within the Ministry of Posts and Telecommunications, the lead agency for this commitment.

However, during the implementation period, a redesigned eLiberia portal was officially launched. It made some government services available online. These included applications for passports, online payment of taxes, birth registration forms, and farmers e-registration. ^[107] As the commitment was not started, it did not change practices in relation to open government.