Posts Tagged ‘implementation’
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25 March 2015
RTI Law in Indian State Not Implemented, Critics Say
The six-year old right to information law in the Indian state of Jammu & Kashmir is not being fully implemented, according to reports on the anniversary of the law. “Six years since the landmark legislation Right to Information Act was implemented in the state, the government itself has failed to adhere to the guidelines of […]
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25 March 2015
Bulgarian Group Proposes Ideas on Rewriting RTI Law
A new report by the Access to Information Programme (AIP) in Bulgaria proposes ways to handle five major implementation problems. Based on its “18 years of experience in the monitoring and advocacy for enhanced transparency and accountability of public bodies and more active exercise of the right to information,” AIP formulated recommendations for necessary legislative […]
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17 March 2015
White House Cements Exemption From FOIA
The White House Office of Administration on March 17 officially exempted itself from the Freedom of Information Act, relying on a seven-year-old court decision. The Office of Administration amended its regulations, relying on a judicial decision from 2009 in which U.S. District Judge Coleen Kollar-Kotelly dismissed a government watchdog’s lawsuit seeking records on missing White House […]
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13 March 2015
Proactive Disclosure Lags in US, Archive Audit Finds
Only 40 percent of US government agencies systematically post online the records released through Freedom of Information Act requests, according to an audit done by the National Security Archive. The Archive team audited 165 federal agencies and found only 67 with online libraries populated with significant numbers of released FOIA documents and regularly updated. Proactive […]
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12 March 2015
Positives and Negatives Seen in Review of Georgia FOI
Positive changes in terms of access to public information in Georgia were seen immediately after the parliamentary elections of October 2012, but the level of access to information was gradually decreasing in a number of state entities, according to a new report by the Institute for Development of Freedom of Information. IDFI has been monitoring […]
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12 March 2015
Department of State Email Preservation Rate Hovers under 0.000061%
By Lauren Harper and Nate Jones This column appeared March 11 in Unredacted, a blog from the National Security Archive, the publisher of FreedomInfo.org. Harper and Jones are Archive staff members. Today’s Department of State Office of Inspector General report has some scary numbers on the number of emails the Department actually preserves. Hillary Clinton […]
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5 March 2015
The Hillary Emails; and a Suggested Fix
By Lauren Harper and Nate Jones The National Security Archive and other groups recently proposed an amendment to the House FOIA Reform bill that would allow all FOIA processors access to all electronic records systems for the processing of FOIA requests. This fix would have gone a long way in allowing State Department FOIA processors and […]
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5 March 2015
Only Quarter of Indian Bodies Making Mandatory Disclosures
Only about one quarter of Indian public authorities are posting online information required to be made public under the Right to Information Act, according to the Central Information Commission annual report (text not yet posted on CIC website). Of the 2,276 public authorities, 667 are complying with the mandatory suo-motu (Latin for “on its own […]
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5 March 2015
The Power of a Question in El Salvador
By Max Heywood This article first appeared March 2 on the Transparency International blog. Heywood is Programme Coordinator in the Americas Department of Transparency International. Read this in Spanish here. Transparency laws mean nothing if they are not applied, and it sometimes takes brave citizens and active civil society organisations to make sure that they are. […]
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26 February 2015
Backlash Develops Over Release of Body Cam Footage
By Toby McIntosh and Lauren Harper Bills to restrict or prevent the public disclosure of videos taken by police officers wearing cameras are sparking debate in state legislatures around the United States. Anti-disclosure bills have been offered in half a dozen states, usually by legislators with law enforcement backgrounds. “Video recordings should not be subject […]
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19 February 2015
Mexico: OGP Leader Faking Transparency
By Ana Cristina Ruelas The author is the Right to Information Program Officer at ARTICLE 19, México and Central America Mexico became the lead chairman of the Open Government Partnership (OGP) on 2014, although we are far from openness. The government’s rhetoric is all about transparency and co-creation but in their offices they are pushing us […]
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18 February 2015
South Africa: Not So Transparent After All
By Candice Bailey The author is a journalist with Corruption Watch. This article first appeared Feb. 16 in The Star. Reprinted with permission. Johannesburg – When the Gauteng High Court granted civil society campaigners Right2Know access to a list of the country’s national key points, the award was lauded as a victory in the battle for […]
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9 February 2015
Sudanese Journalists Wary of New FOI Law
By Lori Baitarian The author is an intern in the Committee for the Protection of Journalists’ Middle East and North Africa Program and holds a BA in political studies from the American University of Beirut. The article first appeared in the CPJ blog and is reprinted with permission. The Sudanese government has boasted that its […]
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5 February 2015
Nigeria FOI Advocates Seek More Training of Judges
Nigerian Freedom of Information advocates on Feb. 2 called for “the sensitization of judges” about the Freedom of Information Act because many of them are issuing “decisions that are inconsistent with the spirit and letters of the Law.” In a communiqué at the end of their three-day Freedom of Information Implementers Strategy Meeting, held in […]
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5 February 2015
Mendel Paper Suggests Ways to Improve Implementation
Ideas for improving the implementation of right to information laws are discussed in a new “working paper,” by Toby Mendel, Director of the Centre for Law and Democracy. The 30-page “Designing Right to Information Laws for Effective Implementation,” was the subject of a webinar sponsored by the World Bank Feb. 5. Some of the suggestions are […]
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4 February 2015
Report Scores Compliance With South Africa Access Law
Government compliance with South Africa’s 15-year-old Promotion of Access to Information Act is in a “sorry state,” according to one summary of a recently released “shadow report” by the PAIA Civil Society Network. “Its findings show that while patterns of compliance are not as dire as has been the case in recent years and there have […]
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29 January 2015
Rwanda Groups Establish Site for Making Access Requests
A new web portal established by Rwandan nongovernmental organizations will facilitate access to information. The new web portal is designed to provide an online channel for inquiries to be submitted straight to information officers. The website, Sobanukirwa, makes it possible to make requests anonymously. Sobanukirwa is translated into English, French and Kinyarwanda. Fredrick Akaranganwa, the Head […]
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22 January 2015
FOI Notes: Many Countries, Many Transparency Topics
Scotland: Reforms are necessary to counter the erosion the law, according to an anniversary report by Scottish Information Commissioner Rosemary Agnew. India: “What has ten years of RTI achieved?” asks the headline to an article in The Tribune by Pamerla Philipose. Open Government Partnership: “What to watch for in 2015,” an outlook article by the OGP staff. […]
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15 January 2015
India May Permit Stamps to Be Used for RTI Payments
The Indian Department of Personnel and Training (DoPT) has invited comment on the idea of letting requesters use postage stamps to pay for the costs of seeking information under the Right to Information Act. The department which administers the act also has set up a committee to discuss the proposal. Comments are due by Feb. […]
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1 January 2015
2014: A Year of Attempts to Strangle the RTI
By Vinita Deshmukh The author is a prize-winning journalist, a consulting editor of Moneylife, an RTI activist and convener of the Pune Metro Jagruti Abhiyaan. The article was published Dec. 31 in Moneylife. Strapline: Political parties defying summons by CIC, a headless information commission and much more meant a low year for this otherwise strong […]