OpenGovAfrica/oga-public-office-register

An open, verifiable, Africa-wide record of public officials and their career trajectories. ### OGA Public Office Register A verifiable, Africa-wide public record of individuals who hold or have held public office, their roles, tenures, and affiliations — built for long-term civic use, auditability, and cross-country comparison. ### Project Status This repository represents the **foundational stage** of the OGA Public Office Register. Core architecture, data models, and contribution standards are being established. There is **no pre-existing environment or legacy system**; early contributors are expected to help design and implement the initial scaffolding that future contributors will build upon. The project is intended to outlive any single program or contributor and is maintained as long-term civic infrastructure. ### Project Goals The OGA Public Office Register aims to: - Maintain a permanent, verifiable record of public officials across African countries - Support diverse governance systems: - Unicameral and bicameral legislatures - Elected, appointed, and traditional authority roles - Enable cross-country and historical comparison - Enforce strong provenance and auditability for every record - Provide structured, reusable data for journalists, researchers, and civic technologists This project is designed to scale across: - 54+ countries - Multiple languages and naming conventions - National, regional, and local levels of government ### What This Project Is (and Is Not) **This project is:** - A long-term civic data infrastructure project - A source-driven, verifiable registry of public officeholders - Designed for gradual expansion and community stewardship **This project is not:** - A scraped or crowd-sourced dataset without verification - A country-specific tracker - A closed or proprietary data platform All published records must be attributable to reliable sources. ### Core Design Principles - **Individual-first data modeling**: People, roles, organizations, and tenures are modeled separately to preserve accuracy over time. - **Stron …