Over the past few weeks, I’ve spent quite a bit of time helping people with governance proposals, so I put together a guide that may be useful if you’re preparing one yourself.

It has already been used for several successful proposals, so the process is tested in practice.

Note: this guide covers the technical part of creating and submitting a proposal. For a proposal to pass, you also need to communicate it clearly and build support around it.

Consider publishing the full proposal description on GitHub, sharing it with the community, and discussing it with participants on Discord and other relevant channels before and during the voting period.

How to Create and Submit a Governance Proposal on Gonka

Step-by-step for submitting and voting with inferenced. Aligned with Gonka — Transactions & Governance. Replace every placeholder with your own values before running commands.

1. Placeholders and shell exports

Run once per terminal session (edit the right-hand sides):

export GONKA_RPC="<PUBLIC_RPC>"
export GONKA_API="<PUBLIC_HTTP_API>"
export CHAIN_ID="<CHAIN_ID>"
export ACCOUNT_NAME="<KEY_NAME>"

All later commands assume these variables are set. If a command fails with “connection” or “parse”, check that GONKA_RPC ends with exactly one /chain-rpc/.

2. Two URLs (do not mix them)

Using $GONKA_RPC for --node-address in create-client is incorrect and will fail or hit the wrong service.

3. Prerequisites

3.1 Install CLI

Download a build for your OS from Gonka releases, unpack, then:

chmod +x inferenced
./inferenced --help

On macOS, if Gatekeeper blocks the binary: System Settings → Privacy & Security → Open Anyway.

3.2 Read min_deposit and voting_period from the chain

Do not rely on a fixed ngonka amount from old docs—query the live values:

./inferenced query gov params \
  --node "$GONKA_RPC" \
  --chain-id "$CHAIN_ID" \
  -o json | jq '{min_deposit: .params.min_deposit, voting_period: .params.voting_period}'

Your proposal JSON’s deposit must satisfy min_deposit (same denom, amount ≥ minimum).

3.3 Proposal JSON

Prepare a gov v1 JSON (messages, metadata, deposit, title, summary).

There are two main parts to prepare:

1. Proposal description fields

   Keep the on-chain text short and clear.

   Make sure the proposal includes:

   • a short summary of what the proposal is about;
   • a link to the full proposal description with all details;
   • the wallet address where the funds should be sent, if the proposal requests funding;
   • the requested amount and denom, if the proposal requests funding.

2. Proposal JSON structure

   For the JSON structure, the best approach is to look at previous proposals and use them as references.

   You can inspect previous proposal JSONs here to see how different proposal types are structured.

   In many cases, it is easier to start from a similar previous proposal and adapt it to your own proposal.

For messages such as MsgUpdateParams, the chain expects the full params object and correct authority (gov module address). Fetch the gov module address:

./inferenced query auth module-accounts \
  --node "$GONKA_RPC" \
  --chain-id "$CHAIN_ID" \
  -o json | jq -r '.accounts[] | select(.value.name=="gov") | .value.address'

Use that address as authority where the message type requires it.

If the jq line prints nothing, run the same query without jq once and locate the gov module entry manually. The output shape can differ slightly by SDK version.

3.4 Optional: new key + register participant (create-client)

This creates a key and calls the seed HTTP API (participant registration). Use $GONKA_API only:

./inferenced create-client "$ACCOUNT_NAME" \
  --node-address "$GONKA_API"

Store the mnemonic safely. If you already have a funded key for governance, skip this and avoid double registration.

Use the same --keyring-backend everywhere (e.g. file) for keys show, tx gov submit-proposal, and tx gov vote.

4. Publish the proposal on-chain

4.1 Check balance

./inferenced query bank balances \
  "$(./inferenced keys show "$ACCOUNT_NAME" -a --keyring-backend file)" \
  --node "$GONKA_RPC" \
  --chain-id "$CHAIN_ID"

Ensure you have enough ngonka (or the fee denom your node expects) for min_deposit and fees.

4.2 Submit

Recommended pattern from the official Gonka doc:

./inferenced tx gov submit-proposal "<PATH_TO_PROPOSAL_JSON>" \
  --from "$ACCOUNT_NAME" \
  --keyring-backend file \
  --chain-id "$CHAIN_ID" \
  --node "$GONKA_RPC" \
  --unordered --timeout-duration=60s \
  --gas 2000000 --gas-adjustment 5.0 \
  --yes

After submission, note the proposal number from the output or find it here.

Share the proposal number so the community announcement can go out.

5. Vote (after voting has started)

5.1 Read the proposal on-chain

./inferenced query gov proposal "$PROPOSAL_ID" \
  --node "$GONKA_RPC" \
  --chain-id "$CHAIN_ID" \
  -o json

Confirm status, title, summary, messages, and voting times before voting.

5.2 Optional: tally so far

./inferenced query gov tally "$PROPOSAL_ID" \
  --node "$GONKA_RPC" \
  --chain-id "$CHAIN_ID" \
  -o json

Use $GONKA_RPC as-is—do not append /chain-rpc/ again.

5.3 Cast a vote

Replace yes with no, abstain, or no_with_veto if you intend to vote that way:

./inferenced tx gov vote "$PROPOSAL_ID" yes \
  --from "$ACCOUNT_NAME" \
  --keyring-backend file \
  --chain-id "$CHAIN_ID" \
  --node "$GONKA_RPC" \
  --unordered --timeout-duration=60s \
  --gas 2000000 --gas-adjustment 5.0 \
  --yes

You may change your vote by sending another vote before the voting period ends.

That’s it! Good luck with your proposal!

If you have comments, suggestions, or anything to add from your own experience, feel free to share them. We can keep improving the guide together. And if any part feels unclear, let me know as well.