Blaming a lack of meeting space, the leader of the Ghana Parliament has delayed action until next year on a right to information bill.
The excuse was offered by Alban S.K. Bagbin, the majority leader in Parliament, who said the RTI bill would be passed in the first quarter of next year.
Bagbin’s suggestion that there weren’t rooms large enough to work out a compromise seems to contradict strong indications that compromise language had been largely worked out, a point Bagbin seemed to concede.
According to Ghana Business News, “He said huge amendment work has been done on the Bill and has been fine-tuned to enhance Ghana’s democracy.”
“Mr Bagbin attributed the delay in passing the Bill to lack of office accommodation for civil society organisations and other stakeholders, including Members of Parliament to work together,” the article says.
Bagbin reportedly “gave the assurance that with the completion of the Job 600 facility for Members of Parliament to be used as offices, it would help fast track work on the RTI Bill.”
The outlook for the bill recently had seemed promising. The RTI bill on Oct. 26 was listed among the bills to be considered. General debate, occurred in July. (See previous Freedominfo.org report.) Also see video of some of the debate on July 15.
However, a dark cloud had appeared in early October when Ghana’s President John Dramani Mahama cast doubt on the value of a RTI law, while still indicating he thought the bill will be passed.
The president’s remarks came in an Oct. 7 DW television interview with Tim Sebastian and caused the Coalition on the Right to Information Coalition in an Oct. 13 statement to call his comments “very disappointing.” (See previous FreedomInfo.org report.)
Bagbin’s reported comments surprised advocates of the bill because before he became majority leader he chaired the committee that had developed the amended bill before Parliament.
One person close to the situation told FreedomInfo.org:
Further negotiation especially with vocal and influential MPs outside the Committee that work on the Bill is still needed, and the Coalition is currently preparing for that. The aim is to secure their support for the Committee’s proposed amendments on the Bill during the consideration stage. However, office/venue for the engagement is not a problem.
Efforts to pass a law in Ghana have been underway since 1999
Filed under: What's New