KP Right to Information Act 2013
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Transcript of KP Right to Information Act 2013
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KP Right to Information Act 2013:
A Briefing Gulbaz Ali Khan
Senior Manager-Governance & CD
Citizen Engagement for Social Service Delivery
Government of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa
Citizen Engagement for Social Service Delivery
What is Social Accountability
• It is an approach towards building accountability that relies on civic engagement, i.e., in which it is ordinary citizens and/or civil society organizations who participate directly or indirectly in exacting accountability (WB 2004)
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Citizen Engagement for Social Service Delivery
Why Social Accountability?
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Social Accountability
Good Governance
Development Effectiveness
Empowerment
Citizen Engagement for Social Service Delivery
Social Accountability Tools
• Election Monitoring• Participatory budgeting• Public Expenditure Tracking• Public feedback mechanisms like Social Audits• Community/citizen monitoring of over-all performance of
public agencies, e.g. through Citizen Report Cards and Community Scorecards
• Public disclosure initiatives• Right to information
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Citizen Engagement for Social Service Delivery
What is Right to Information?
• Access to information is the cornerstone to good governance, meaningful participation, increasing transparency and is recognized as a fundamental human right
• Freedom of information legislation comprises laws that guarantee access to data held by the state. They establish a "right-to-know" legal process by which requests may be made for government-held information, to be received freely or at minimal cost, barring standard exceptions.
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Citizen Engagement for Social Service Delivery
What is Right to Information?
• The right of access to information detained by government officials gives that citizens have a basic human right to demand information held by government bodies.
• RTI legislations endorse two ways of information sharing:
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Reactive disclosure
Proactive dissemination
Citizen Engagement for Social Service Delivery
A Powerful Social Accountability Tool: Right to Information:
• The Right to information is considered a powerful tool to ensure social accountability as:
– It facilitates a constructive engagement between public authorities and citizens.
– It addresses the response and voice aspects of governance.
– It’s a tool for checking :• Corruption, abuse of power and mismanagement among public
bodies, contributing directly to advancing the agenda on good governance
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Citizen Engagement for Social Service Delivery
Journey of RTI-Global & Pakistan
• Originated in Sweden in 1766 which provide access to information to journalists
• UN Accepted this as fundamental human right in 1946• More than 96 countries have RTI laws
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Citizen Engagement for Social Service Delivery
KP Right To Information Act
• RTI Law has been passed by KP assembly on October 31, 2013 and Governor assented on November 04, 2013 (KP Assembly)
• The law bestows the right to access to any information or record held by a body. It also states that it facilitates and encourages the disclosure of information, promptly and at the lowest reasonable cost.
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Citizen Engagement for Social Service Delivery
What kind of information is available?
• Maintenance and indexing of public records • Publication and availability of records
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Citizen Engagement for Social Service Delivery
Annual Reporting & PIOs
• Public body is bound to prepare an annul report featuring state of RTI implementation and submit to – Speaker of KP Assembly – Information Commission
• All the public bodies will designate public information officer within 120 days from the date of commencement of this act
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Citizen Engagement for Social Service Delivery
What citizen can not access?
• This law also restricts access to information on a) international relations & security, b) disclosure harmful to law enforcement, c) public economic affairs, d) policy making, e) privacy, f) legal privilege, and g) commercial and confidential information.
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Citizen Engagement for Social Service Delivery
Process of disposal of information request
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Citizen file an information request
Acknowledgement By Information
Officer
Information Granted (10 days
extendable to 20 days)
Information Rejected
Complaint lodged
with Information Commission
Information already
provided and/or
available proactively
Decision by Information Commission
within 60 days
Citizen Engagement for Social Service Delivery
What if information is denied?
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Daily fine of PKR 250/- per day up to PKR 25000 imposed on public official
Citizen Engagement for Social Service Delivery
What constitutes Information Commission?
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•Members shall hold offices for a term of 3 years•Members shall not hold office after they have attained age of 65 years •A member can be removed through majority vote (2 out of 3) in case he/she fails to attend 3 consecutive meetings without any cause
Citizen Engagement for Social Service Delivery
How Information Commission can be instrumental?
• Primary function is to receive and decide upon the complaints
• In addition to this:– Set rules and minimum standards on record management – Designate further categories of proactive disclosure (Website) – Adopt a schedule of fee (information requests) – Compile a user-friendly manual in Urdu and English (4 all) – Compile a comprehensive on its activities, audited accounts and
state of implementation in public bodies (course correction)
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Citizen Engagement for Social Service Delivery
How Information Commission can be instrumental?
• The commission has powers to – monitor and report the compliance, – make recommendations on reforms and
comments on legislations, and – facilitate and/or support training activities for
public officials and – publicize the requirements and rights of the
citizens
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Citizen Engagement for Social Service Delivery
THANK YOU
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