Ghana RTI coalition exposes NPP and NDC’s lip service to the Right To Information law

As Monday, September 28, 2020, marks the International Day for Universal Access to Information, the coalition bemoaned the lack of political will that the two major political parties have exhibited in ensuring the RTI law is operationalised to serve the purpose it was meant for.

Speaking at a press conference organised by the coalition in commemoration of the IDUAI, vice-chair of the Ghana RTI coalition Mina Mensah lamented how difficult it is to access information from state institutions currently despite the passage of the Right To Information law.

According to her, although the government and its officials keep espousing measures they claim to have put in place for easy access to information from public institutions, what happens, in reality, is a direct opposite.

“An exercise commissioned by our coalition towards accessing information from eighteen (18) public institutions in Accra and Kumasi between June and August this year showed a disappointing 11% compliance. Out of the eighteen requests made in the two biggest cities where a lot of public institutions under this Act are based, only two institutions responded to the requests, with the remaining institutions completely ignoring the requests made to them to date.

“We also discovered that only eight of the institutions, less than 50% had information officers appointed or designated to process requests. This is in sharp contrast to the provisions of the Act, and the public announcement by the Minister for Information in February this year that all MDAs have been directed to designate their information officers to enable people to access information as required by the law.

“We find these developments worrying, considering that the ministry’s representative at the coalition’s webinar held in June this year announced that it had developed and widely circulated to all public institutions as at 5th January 2020, a transition document for implementation, referred to as the ‘Transition Pack’ which included guidelines for compliance; guidelines for designating existing staff within institutions to serve as information officers, and Standard Application Form which encapsulated the application procedures spelt out in the Act,” a press statement issued by the RTI coalition reads in part.

The coalition further expressed disappointment at the NDC for not prioritizing the RTI in its election 2020 manifesto, knowing very well the challenges that have bedeviled the implementation of the law. According to the coalition, although the RTI was mentioned in the party’s manifesto, it didn’t get the elaborate attention it deserves.

“More disappointing is the nearly absent indications in the manifesto of the opposition National Democratic Congress on the issue of RTI. Under the section titled ‘Freedom of the Media’ in their manifesto, they provide a one-liner that reads ‘continue the implementation of the Right To Information Act 2019.’

“Not only is this an inadequate indication of what they commit to do on RTI if they are voted into office, but they also continue in the erroneous impression that the RTI law is all about the media, considering the section under which they captured this promise,” the press statement added.

The coalition has indicated that it will soon begin naming and shaming public institutions that are not complying with the RTI law.