You're reading: Election 2012 blog: Violation? Report it through an interactive map

Watching an election campaign is now easier than ever - you can do it with the help of your very own laptop. While classical systems for filing reports of violations through the Central Election Committee are becoming obsolete (or at the very least - a tool for fighting your opponents), the real reporting of violations has moved online to new interactive projects based on crowd-sourcing principles.

So, if you have spotted a violation of the election law, you can report it within minutes. You can also see what others are reporting.

There are several interactive maps that have been launched during this parliamentary campaign.

One of them, Violations Map launched by Opora civic network, is not just useful for seeing who is naughty where, it also provides useful information about limits of constituencies and locations of voting stations. It will have data on election watchers soon, too. After election map will provide vote results in each region.

Opora website says that map will be useful for journalists, voters, activists, candidates and authorities. However, it gives very limited access for the users wishing to fill the site with election-related information. There is a form for reporting violations, but Opora warns that anonymous reports won’t be taken in account and demands that full name and surname and phone number are submitted. The information will remain confidential, however.

The report card allows the user to pick from a limited list of suggested violations: bribing voters, campaigning violations, involvement of authorities in the election campaign, involvement of police in the campaign, obstruction to  campaigning, pressure on the media.

So far, according to Opora map, Lugansk is the leader in violations, with 31 reports coming from this easern region.

Another map, ElectUa, designed by Internews Ukraine, is focused on reporting violations by users, with pre-moderation. Reporting is possible via online form, e-mail, Facebook, Twitter or phone.

ElectUa shares statistics on where reports come from. It looks like reporting through social networks is not in high demand yet, since 254 out of 264 violations reports arrived through the online form, and only 10 were filed using Facebook.

In this map, too, Lugansk is a leader, along with Donetsk and Vinnitsya regions. Violations in Kyiv were only reported five times, and one of these reports is still pending approval. Reports are really varied, and include  beating of an agitator, bribing voters, giving out presents for school pupils and distribution of illegal campaign material.

ElectUa says that its aim is “to engage citizens into monitoring of the election process.”

The third interactive map, Maidan Monitoring, has collected 756 reports of violations in all regions. Here, Kyiv emerged as a leader with 83 violations. There is also a function for separate maps  for various types of violations.

Maidan Monitoring was launched early and has been collecting reports since December 2011. Like Opora’s map, it only accepts reports through  the online form that requires some personal information. It also has a collection of photos and documents confirming reported violations, a function also available in other maps, but not used so widely by their contributors.

All violations maps are available in English.

Kyiv Post staff writer Olga Rudenko can be reached at [email protected].