Accra, November 25, 2019//-Former director of Ghana Integrity Initiative (GII), Vitus Azeem says the Right to Information (RTI) law is potent weapon that would shine on corruption in the country.
But he said this could only be achieved if there is a political will.
According to Mr Azeem, it would take only political will and determination of the citizens to use RTI to fight corruption. Since it is meant to ensure that the citizens of this country have access to official information.
Additionally, he said an improvement in the right to information can only make a difference only if the ordinary people can freely use the information including sharing it publicly and would not be hunted.
According to him, what is information “when you cannot write it in your newspaper and cannot sit in your radio station and talk about it, then what is it to you?”
Mr Aseem was part of the three panelists that discussed the topic: “Combating corruption vis-à-vis the People’s Right to Information” organised by Friendrich Ebert Stiftung (FES) together with institute of Law and Public Affairs (ILPA) at the sixth series of the Accra Dialogue held last week Thursday.
He questioned how RTI could be achieved when public officers swear the oath of secrecy yet all information held by public bodies is public information and should be made public.
As it is the right of a citizen to request for information, he argued that the information that would be supplied should be simple, speedily and free and all refusals must be justifiable and based on law.
Public institutions should proactively make public core information that are current, clear and in plain language, he demanded.
Nana Oye Lithur, a former Minister for Gender, Children and Social Protection also added: “We are losing so much money through corruption. …$3 billion a year is lost due to corrupt practices,” while the amount can afford Ghanaians with the provision of social amenities to make their lives comfortable.
She said the fight of corruption is a responsibility of the citizens to ensure that the $3 billion actually gets into back into their pockets and it used for the purpose of developing Ghana.
Madam Lithur urged the public to find out “Which institutions are investigating and addressing some of these cases.”
She added that there are a number of anticorruption agencies in Ghana – Economic Organise Crime (EOCO), Attorney General, Auditor General and Office of the Special Prosecutor but the nation is yet realise their impact.
“What are their mandates? Is there duplicity of functions? Is there any challenge in terms of cooperation? And I see a challenge in terms of cooperation. Are they sharing information, investigating these cases together? Exactly what are they doing? Can they present combined annual report on how and to what extent they have addressed corruption in Ghana? We the citizens need to sit down and watch over our resource,” she stated.
By Akutu Dede Adimer, African Eye Report
