Africa: Gilbert Sendugwa, Coordinator and Head of the Africa Freedom of Information Centre (AFIC), a pan-African network of 35 organizations based in Uganda, is featured in an IFEX podcast (text also available there) along with links to resources about FOI in Africa. Last September, AFIC released a report called The State of Right to Information in Africa, which looks at 14 African nations and makes some very specific recommendations.
Ireland: The government’s FOI website gets hacked. See Irish Mirror report.
United Kingdom: Martin Rosenbaum, the BBC’s Freedom of information specialist reports:
Forty police forces across the country have dismissed as “vexatious” a BBC freedom of information (FOI) application about police monitoring of journalists’ communications.
It appears the police have adopted a virtually blanket policy of now rejecting all FOI requests about the use of their surveillance powers to collect communications data on journalists – irrespective of the questions actually asked or how often, if at all, that requester has raised the issue before.
Brazil: TIC Governo Electrônico 2013, A new survey and report on the use of information and communication technologies in the Brazilian public sector, in Portuguese and English.
Brazil: A new book (in Portuguese) by Fabiano Angelico explains the origins, purposes and history of the ATI and transparency bill in Brazil.
Nepal: A report on a March 22 national meting A One-Day Meeting with Strategic Partners, Partner CSOs and organization working on RTI for forming a National Coalition on RTI was held on 22nd March 2015 in Kathmandu.
India: According to a Centre for Governance and Public Accountability posting, the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Right to Information Commission (RTIC) on Friday signed a memorandum of understanding (MoU) with the CGPA to install a toll-free helpline with a view to facilitate the citizens in exercising their constitutional right to information.
Chile: The Journal Transparencia y Sociedad (Transparency and Society), promoted by Consejo para la Transparencia (Council of Transparency in Chile), seeks to enhance, promote and expand knowledge about transparency and right to access information among scholars. The publication’s focus is Latin America and its contents are published in Spanish. The last article in issue 2 is about the criteria settled by the Transparency Council regarding the deliberative privilege. The third issue is due out in May.
United Kingdom: The government has failed to fulfill a pledge to publish contracts, according to an article on Computer Weekly.
UK/India: Ben Worthy of the University of London, Birkbeck College writes on “Access to Information in the UK and India.”
Abstract: This paper examines the impact of two pieces of transparency legislation: the UK Freedom of Information Act 2005 and the Indian Right to Information Act 2005. It looks at the origins and composition of the laws before examining how the two pieces of legislation function. Both laws have led to transparency and accountability by exposure and raising of ‘fire alarms’, with information disclosure used to bring about accountability as well as, to a more limited extent, reform and behaviour change. Of the two laws, the Indian RTI has proved more ‘politicised’ and more capable of initiating political participation. Yet the ‘transformative’ powers of such reforms are limited by poor implementation and resistance. Moreover, the effectiveness of such laws is shaped by context, with India in particular facing deep and complex socio-political obstacles that may prevent the laws having the ‘revolutionary’ effects advocates hoped.
New Zealand: An article in the journal Public Sector considers whether the Official Information Act itself is weak or if improvements can be made to the way it’s interpreted.
United States: Cause of Action reports that 11 of 15 agencies tested for FOIA responsiveness received a “C” or worse letter grade, with the Departments of Treasury, Homeland Security, and Education each receiving an “F.”
United States: Agencies Post their 2015 Chief FOIA Officer Reports during Sunshine Week 2015.
United States: The US PIRG reports: “Government spending transparency is improving, but many states still lag far behind, according to “Following the Money 2015: How the 50 States Rate in Providing Online Access to Government Spending Data,” the sixth annual report of its kind by the U.S. Public Interest Research Group Education Fund. Some states have improved their spending transparency web portals significantly, and even introduced entirely new state-of-the-art transparency sites with innovative features, while others are still barely achieving the minimum standards.”
United States: The Federal Chief Information Officers (CIO) Council has won the infamous Rosemary Award for worst open government performance of 2014, according to the citation published by the National Security Archive.
United States: The CIA’s nine-year resistance to releasing its Official History of the Bay of Pigs Operation was given the FOIA Failure Award by The FOIA Project, a non-profit organization that says it seeks ” to provide the public with timely and complete information about every instance in which the federal government grants or withholds records under the Freedom of Information Act.
United States: The Pennsylvania Right-to-Know law has led to a wide range of journalistic successes over the past year, according to a summary.
United States: Five years after Illinois created a “public access counselor” to help resolve complaints between members of the public and agencies in public records disputes the office has a large and growing backlog., according to a Chicago Sun Times article.
MultiStakeholder Initiatives: See a report on a workshop on Multi-Stakeholder Initiatives and Governance: What did we learn and where to go from here? held February 11 and 12 by the Transparency and Accountability Initiative (T/AI), with the support of the World Bank.
Trade Talk Transparency: The European Ombudsman has welcomed “the latest steps taken by the European Commission to increase the transparency of the on-going Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP) negotiations.
United Kingdom: Blogger Paul Gibbons writes “The ten things FOI requesters hate most.”
Going Silent
Waiting until the last working day to request clarification
Weasel words
Speaking another language
Providing data in an unhelpful format
Inventing rules,
Giving contradictory answers
Not appearing to know whether information is held
Inconsistency between public authorities
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