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RTI bill will be passed in 100 days - Bawumia assures
According to Bawumia, the bill has been before parliament for too long and will show commitment towards its passage.
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According to him, the bill has been before parliament for too long and will show commitment towards its passage.
"Our government has already made it clear that we will be passing the Right to Information Act. We will make sure a special prosecutor’s office is set up to prosecute corruption and we will amend the criminal code to move the corruption from a misdemeanor to a felony. These are just some of the actions we intend to implement this year," he said at a forum in Accra.
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The RTI bill has suffered several setbacks in Parliament with the Right to Information Coalition, earlier threatening to stage a protest against government over the delay in the passage of the Bill.
The right to information bill is a fundamental human right guaranteed by the country’s 1992 Constitution and recognised as a right under the International Convention on Human Rights. The bill will give substance to Article 21 (1) (f) of the constitution which state "All persons shall have the right to information subject to such qualifications and laws as are necessary for a democratic society".
The bill was drafted in 1999 and reviewed in 2003, 2005 and 2007 but was not presented to Parliament.
This is affirmed by Article 1(1) of the 1992 Constitution which categorically states that ‘the sovereignty of Ghana resides in the people of Ghana in whose name and for whose welfare the powers of government are to be exercised.’ This principle is affirmed by article 21(1)(f) of the same Constitution which grants ‘all persons . The right to information subject to such qualifications and laws as are necessary in a democratic society’.
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Read more:Right to Information Bill withdrawn
The right to information is fundamental to the realisation of economic and social rights as well as civil and political rights. The right to information lays the foundation upon which to build good governance, transparency, accountability, participation, and check arbitrariness and corruption in public life.
The Coalition on the Right to Information has undertaken several projects to raise awareness on the need for a right to information legislation but the sixth parliament was unable to pass the bill.
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