A legal practitioner, Mr Akoto Ampaw, has called on Ghanaians to take interest in the Right to Information Bill and contribute to debates on it before it is passed into law by Parliament.
He was of the view that the existing bill, reviewed by a cabinet technical sub-committee, when passed into law could lead instead to non-disclosure.
Mr Ampaw, said that a few negative provisions had been added to the bill which was before Parliament, and that Ghanaians as a people had to send memorandum to Parliament to ensure that the negative provisions were changed and not passed into law to protect the sovereignty bestowed on them by the Constitution.
He, however, commended the government for tabling the Right to Information Bill before Parliament as part of its campaign promise to pass it into law.
Mr Akoto Ampaw who was speaking at the World Press Freedom Day in Accra on Friday, said some of the negative provisions were the blanket exemption of the office of the President, Vice President and Cabinet from the Right to Information Bill.
Mr Ampaw said if there should be malfeasance , it could have a devastating effect on the country if the three offices were exempted from scrutiny.
He said another critical area was the national security which had been associated with heinous crimes such as arresting people, and to exempt them would be a step backward.
He said the litmus test of every right to information law was whether the information when released could harm public interest, and that these ought to be explained.
Mr Ampaw said blanket exceptions, were therefore, a challenge to the bill which sought to empower ordinary people to check corruption and arbitrariness in the exercise of power.
He wondered how many Ghanaians would use the right to information law to demand information when they had to pay, and called on Parliament to come out with a simplified fee-regime than the current complex fees regime in the bill.
He explained, for instance that the longer it took a government agency to compile an information the more the one demanding the information would pay even if it was the inefficiency on the part of the government agency that contributed to the delay.
He said what was more dangerous was that the right to appeal was not to an independent body but to Minister of Justice who was a politician, and that it would amount to non-disclosure.
Mr Ampaw said five countries in Africa, among them Angola, Ethiopia and Zimbabwe, had the right to information laws but they were rather inimical and amounted to non-disclosure instead of promoting disclosure.
He said the right to information law would promote participation and enhance openness, transparency and accountability on the part of public office holders.
Mr Ampaw therefore called on stakeholders to table broadcasting laws before Parliament for the debate to begin.
Mr Ransford Tetteh, President of the Ghana Journalists Association (GJA), in a welcome address, said after the dust had settled in the struggle for the liberalisation of the national airwaves, the time had come for a regulatory framework to guide broadcasting in the country.
Ms Adjoba Kyiamah, Corporate/Legal Affairs Manager of Accra Brewery, said her organisation sponsored the event because the company believed that openness, transparency, accountability and probity promoted business.
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