HE five-year old
campaign by stake-holders to push through a legis-lation guaranteeing freer
access to public information in the hands of government and their agents, got a
deserved boost last August when the nation’s lower legislative body, the House
of Representatives, passed the Freedom of Information Bill (FoIB) at its resumed
sitting, after the mandatory third reading.
Designed to give interested citizens the legal right to
access information in the possession of state officials and agencies, the
Freedom of Information Bill also seeks to empower and enable public-spirited
officials of governments and institutions, to volunteer records or information
at their disposal "without prior authorization", if those information are in
public interest, and without adverse or dire consequences to them.
The FoIB is informed by the globally accepted principles of
right to freedom of expression.
As the Media Rights Monitor (MRM), one of the coalition of
civil society sponsors of the FoIB has it, the passage of the bill by the House
of Representatives indicates a greater sensitivity and commitment of the
nation’s legislators to improve and promote the issues of transparency and
accountability in the governance process.
Without access to critical information on governance by
citizens, no democracy will be seen as participatory by nationals in policy
debates, formulation, implementation and evaluation, the Media Rights Monitor
maintains. The FoIB therefore has the potential and capacity to qualitatively
"improve the quality of governance and build the confidence of the people in the
activities of government."
With the advent of the present democratic experiment in 1999,
Nigerians had hoped that a comprehensive enthronement of the democratic ethos
was in the offing and that the new set of political leaders who took the mantle
of leadership from the military were prepared to go the whole hog on the part of
participatory governance.
Labouring under this grand illusion, a coalition of civil
society groups and NGOs had presented a draft bill to President Obasanjo soon
after his inauguration in 1999 expressing support for his inaugural commitment
to fight corruption and observing that this would be quicker accomplished if
citizens had legally sanctioned access to information held by state or its
agencies in order to make informal assessment of governance.
The coalition of stake-holders who presented the draft bill
of freedom of information act had reasoned that accountability and transparency
were crucial ingredients in any meaningful anti-corruption crusade and had
therefore hoped and requested the President to present the draft FoIB as an
executive bill to the legislature and support its enactment into law.
However, when no such thing happened, the FoIB coalition
resorted to presenting the bill to the National Assembly, guided by a singular
zeal to overthrow the culture of secrecy and legal hurdles that encouraged
public officers to hoard critical public interest information under the broad,
nebulous tag of "public-interest". That empowered civil and public servants to
deny seekers of information on governance unless authorised to do so by "higher
authorities".
That good governance is all but impossible under a regime of
secrecy is a truism. And the need for a freedom of information act is so obvious
that governments and international bodies to which Nigeria is signatory, like
the Commonwealth, the United Nations, have all but passed resolutions
guaranteeing free access to information, in the public interest.
The UN, for example, in its resolution of 1946 states that:
‘freedom of information is a fundamental human right and is the touchstone of
all the freedoms to which the United Nations is consecrated." There are many
provisos like this in other international charters on the right of men.
Article 9 of the African Charter on Human and Peoples’ Rights
provides that ‘every individual shall have the right to receive recognition of
the obligations on governments to provide information to their citizens through
clearly defined legal and constitutional channels.
For a government like Nigeria’s which makes a song and dance
out of its determination to enthrone transparency and accountability in
governance and to change the way government conducts its business in our shores,
there is perplexity about official foot-dragging on the issue of the Freedom of
Information Bill.
The House of Representatives belated decision to pass the
amended FoIB is nonetheless commendable. But the real test will be the passage
of the Bill by the upper chamber, the Senate.
And a greater wonder will be when the FoIB scales the
scrutiny of the Senate. Will it be assented into law by the executive? That is
the question.
Though there is no guarantee that the amended bill will
eventually pass the Senate under its present form and become law, there is still
the fear that it may not be obeyed by a national executive that guards its
dealings jealously.
But, for whatever it is worth, the Senate should take a cue
from the lower House and help end the regime of secrecy which has blighted
governance in our nation.
The Senate owes Nigeria that singular duty.
