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Constitutional information service listener survey
Grace Mutandwa, Kubatana.net
June 2010

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Read more about the Constitutional information service here

Executive Summary

This report describes the Constitution information service run by Kubatana.net in April and May 2010 using the Freedom Fone software platform, and shares feedback from a survey of users of this service.

Freedom Fone is an open source Interactive Voice Response (IVR) software platform currently being developed by Kubatana. Freedom Fone helps organisations to share audio information with their constituents by making it easy to set up, update and manage voice menus.

The Constitution information service ran in two phases, and was accessed by a total of 785 different phone numbers. During April 2010, Kubatana invited members of the general public to phone, text and email their questions about the Constitution making process, to be answered by Constitutional Affairs Minister Advocate Eric T. Matinenga. 171 callers phoned in during this time, and 86 questions were submitted.

During May, Zimbabweans were encouraged to phone in to listen to Matinenga's pre-recorded answers to 20 selected questions. 626 Zimbabweans phoned in to listen to this information.

Participants surveyed about the service valued it because it provided them with safe, anonymous access to information that has been difficult for many Zimbabweans to access. However, many callers also reported that the high cost of calls and poor network quality meant that they limited their use of the service. In total, only 12 callers who had phoned in during April with a question also phoned back in May to hear the Minister's answers.

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