A Pakistan Senate Committee Feb. 16 has expressed its displeasure with the lack of progress on Right to Information bill.
“Delay in presenting such an important bill before the Cabinet for approval, is a grave constitutional violation which proves that it is not on priority list of the government despite the fact that the bill is still pending before the Cabinet for the last few months,” remarked Senator Kamil Ali Agha, who was chairing the Senate Committee on Information and Broadcasting, according to an article in The Business Recorder.
Committee members unanimously recommended that the Ministry of Information and Broadcasting should write a letter to the Secretary of Cabinet Division urging that the bill be presented before the Cabinet in its next meeting so that the RTI bill could be tabled in parliament.
Minister for Information, Broadcasting and National Heritage Senator Pervaiz Rashid said that the Secretary of Cabinet Division had assured him that the bill would be taken up on priority basis in the next Cabinet meeting, the newspaper reported. “However, Secretary of the Ministry of Information and Broadcasting Muhammad Azam Khan told the committee that heavy agenda during last three Cabinet meetings was the reason for not taking up the bill.”
The draft bill was forwarded to the Cabinet Secretariat in November of 2014.
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