Search Results
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9 September 2011
OGP Membership Now 28; More Still Expected to Join
Twenty-eight countries have committed to participate in the Open Government Partnership and the list may grow by another dozen, according to informed sources. The official tally of countries having sent in a “letter of intent” was first made available early in the week of Sept. 5 and has been growing incrementally during the week. The Sept. […]
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8 September 2011
Italy, Estonia Join OGP; Aguino Keynote Speaker
Italy and Estonia have joined the list of countries joining the Open Government Partnership, according to information posted on the OGP website. The OGP also unveiled the agenda for the “Power of Open” conference to be held Sept. 20 in New York City, revealing that Philippines President Benigno Aguino, who is being criticized for holding […]
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6 September 2011
Five More Countries Join OGP, Bringing Total to 22
There are 22 countries are now committed to joining the Open Government Partnership, with the latest five additions being Bulgaria, Israel, Croatia, Mongolia and Lithuania, according to a U.S. State Department official. These countries join nine others whose names were disclosed last week and the eight original participants who are on the OGP steering committee. […]
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2 September 2011
17 Countries Pledge to Join Open Government Partnership
Nine countries plus the initial core group of eight have pledged to join the Open Government Partnership (OGP), a U.S. official told FreedomInfo.org Sept. 2, bringing total membership to 17. The nine countries that have sent in “letters of intent” are Kenya, Guatemala, Honduras, Albania, Macedonia, Malta, Georgia, Moldova and Slovakia. More letters are expected, […]
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25 August 2011
OGP Members Begin Work on National Action Plans
Efforts by the eight conveners of the Open Government Partnership to draft their national “action plans” are slowly emerging, according to a FreedomInfo.org survey. However, in most countries the development of a plan does not appear to involve the wide public consultation called for in the “road map” for OGP aspirants to follow. In the […]
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4 August 2011
OGP Releases List of 79 Countries Eligible to Join
The Open Government Partnership has published the names of the 79 countries eligible to join, and their qualifying scores. The list is now available on the OGP website under the “More Documents” heading. The site also includes an explanation of the criteria and the scoring. The spreadsheet does not include the scoring for the countries […]
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15 July 2011
Eight Countries to Join Open Government Partnership
Eight governments have indicated their intention to join the Open Government Partnership, according to Maria Otero, U.S. Undersecretary of State for Democracy and Global Affairs. Speaking at a reception following the July 12 kick-off event in Washington, Otero listed Kenya, Honduras, Mongolia, Chile, Uruguay, Thailand, Liberia and Canada. They would join eight other countries who […]
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12 July 2011
India Withdraws From Open Government Partnership
By Toby McIntosh On the eve of the kick-off event for the Open Government Partnership, India dropped out, but the show went on, with enthusiastic pro-transparency speeches at a day-long event at the U.S. State Department in Washington. The unexpected pull-out by a country with an international reputation for its strong right to information law […]
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24 May 2011
Reasons Advanced for Lack of African FOI Laws
Why does Africa have comparatively few freedom of information laws? The reasons were explored in a number of papers presented at The First Global Conference on Transparency Research held May 19-20 at Rutgers University-Newark, N.J. (See overall report in FreedomInfo.org.) One reason is that the western, liberal concept of access to information conflicts with different traditions […]
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15 April 2011
World Bank Names Winners of Apps Contest
The World Bank April 14 named the winners of a contest to develop digital apps using the Bank’s data. The three winning apps “all feature unique approaches to pressing development challenges,” according to the Bank release which listed the winners: First Prize Winner – StatPlanet World Bank (Australia): With this powerful app, you can visualize […]
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15 April 2011
Multifaceted Strategy Urged to Build Demand for Information
Identifying government information that citizens can use is key to building public support for access to information, according to four leading activists from Africa who spoke April 14 at an Open Society Foundations forum in Washington. Providing an example, Agnes Edo’o, executive director of the Citizens Governance Initiatives in Cameroon, described a recent effort to […]
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25 February 2011
The Case for Freedom of Information in Ghana
By Yakubu Abdulai The writer is a student of Tsinghua University in Beijing. He is currently pursuing a Masters degree in International Development. Hardly a day passes without any media house carrying stories relating to corruption in Ghana. Some of them are high level corruption cases whilst others are simple petty corruption. Corruptions usually starts […]
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11 February 2011
FOI Notes: EU Law, Conferences
EU: A paper prepared by Mario Savino, of Tuscia University of Viterbo (Italy), addresses the topic, “The Right to Open Public Administrations in Europe: Emerging Legal Standards.” It is published by Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development. The paper examines the regulations on access to information where they exist and how transparency policies are implemented […]
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23 September 2010
Campaigns for FOI Laws Under Way World-Wide
Active efforts to pass new or amended freedom of information laws are ongoing in more than a dozen countries, according to a FreedomInfo.org tally. The number suggests the continuation of the trend toward more national FOI laws, but the landscape is not entirely friendly for pro-transparency activists. In South Africa, the government has proposed to […]
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23 September 2010
At UN, Obama Seeks Transparency Commitments
President Barack Obama Sept. 23, speaking to the United Nations General Assembly, called for “specific commitments to promote transparency.” His proposal came after he spoke about the need for open societies, open government, and accountability. He then stated: “In all parts of the world, we see the promise of innovation to make government more open […]
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27 August 2010
Development Aid Mapped With Geo-Referenced Data
Researchers recently unveiled some of the first efforts to map development projects, a technique aimed at improving coordination of effort. Using new “geo-referenced aid data,” the projects by AidData plotted the spatial and sectoral coordination of active projects by the World Bank and the African Development Bank in Kenya and Mozambique. Another project concerned Uganda. […]
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30 July 2010
GTI Urges AfDB to Consult on Disclosure Policy
The Global Transparency Initiative and leaders of several African groups have urged African Development Bank President Donald Kaberuka to conduct public consultations as it reviews its disclosure policy. The Bank has indicated recently that it intends to revamp the Bank’s 2005 disclosure policy, a commitment praised in the July 30 letter to Kaberuka. Less clear is how the […]
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16 July 2010
African Leaders Urged to Support Access to Information Agenda
The Africa Freedom of Information Centre and 47 other groups have sent a letter to African leaders urging them to implement an access to information agenda. The leaders will be meeting for the 15th African Union Summit in Kampala from July 19-27 with an agenda focus on maternal and child health issues. The proposed letter […]
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2 December 2009
World Bank Cautious on Media Development
The goal of strengthening the media as one way to fight corruption was adopted by the World Bank in 2006, but the promise has gone virtually unfulfilled, according to research by freedominfo.org.
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26 May 2009
Secret Summaries of World Bank Meetings Illuminate Proceedings
The “minutes” of the World Bank’s executive board meetings, released publicly, are brief notations of the official action, usually one paragraph. They reveal almost nothing about what transpired during the closed deliberations. The “summaries,” by contrast, describe the key points of discussion. They condense, without names, the comments made by the executive directors. The […]