MY FYI on FOI

Every citizen of any country in the world has a duty to make informed choices about what would be good or better for himself/ herself as an individual for his/ her own country.  This maybe in the form of casting votes for deserving candidates or sponsoring programs of the community or actively participating in programs and policies of other non-governmental organizations or advocate groups.

However choices and decisions should be based on one’s access to information and hence knowing vital facts about certain issues lead to informed choices and sound decision making. The right to information is stated both in Article 19 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and in the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights.  According to the mentioned laws/ covenant:

Everyone shall have the right to freedom of expression; the right shall include freedom to seek, receive and impart information and ideas of all kinds, regardless of frontiers, either orally, in writing or in print, in the form of art, or through any other media of his choice

The exercise of the rights provided for in paragraph 2 of this article carries with it special duties and responsibilities.  It may therefore be subject to certain restrictions, but these shall only be such as are provided by law and are necessary:

For respect of the rights and reputation of others

For the protection of national security or of public order or of public health or morals

The need for the access to information is not a new issue.  Countries around the world have already made laws or decrees to make sure that their citizens have access to information pertinent to their decision making and policy building.  The first country to grant this was Sweden in 1776, back when the people clamored for the right to know the facts held by the king.  Followed by Finland in 1953 then the United States followed due to the need for access to information brought about by the Watergate Scandal.  By 1990, countries that have sponsored or enacted laws or decrees on access to information have already reached to 50 plus.

In the Philippines, the right to information is protected and mandated in the Bills of Rights in our constitution that states that:

The right of the people to information on matters of public concern shall be recognized.  Access to official records, and to documents and papers pertaining to official acts, transactions, or decisions, as well as to government research data used as basis for policy development, shall be afforded to the citizen, subject to such limitations as may be provided by law

The information obtained is then used for sound decision making as was stated in the Supreme Court statement about the right to access to information which states that:

The incorporation in the Constitution of a guarantee of access to information of public concern is recognition of the essentiality of the free flow of ideas and information in a democracy.  In the same way that free discussion enables members of society to cope with the exigencies of their time…, access to information of general interest aids the people in democratic decision- making… giving them a better perspective of the vital issues confronting the nation

It was said that the success of finally being able to run after the Marcos’ wealth stashed in foreign bank accounts can be attributed to the free access to information.  In this case, the information that was instrumental to the success of the case revealed that the Marcos family particularly the late Ferdinand Marcos and his wife Imelda do not have means to amass such wealth given the nature of the jobs they were in during the time that the wealth was gained giving way to the fact that the only possible method of acquiring such wealth will be through illegal and anomalous transactions. 

The Case of Former Supreme Court  Chief Justice Renato Corona also highlighted possible outcomes when the  public has  access of information,  by analyzing  bank records and his statement of assets, liabilities and net worth for several years, it became clear that the wealth of Corona did not match with his current remunerations, making the court decide that his wealth may indeed come from questionable resources which eventually worked against him,  casting doubt to his integrity as a  public servant and an ambassador for good and clean governance.

To fully understand the Executive Order, we must first understand its roots and beginning.  It started as House Bill no. 3732 filed by its principal author Juan Eduardo M. Angara on March10, 2008.  It was first read in Congress on March 11, 2008, approved on Second Reading on April  30, 2008 and then was finally approved on Third Reading on May 12, 2008.  Then it was elevated to the Senate, sponsored by Senators Allan Peter Cayetano and Antonio Trillanes IV.  On December 10, 2009 it was passed on the Third Reading.

The Aquino Administration pushed for the ratification of this bill using it as an instrument to make liable government officials answerable to crimes of corruption and misuse of public funds in its campaign of the “Daang Matuwid”. But the House of Representatives failed to act on it during that administration.  However it is during the Duterte Administration that it was finally signed as an executive order.

Freedom of Information works on the premise that we have a constitutionally protected right to information regarding what the government is doing, including all of its  Executive branches, employees and officials. As long as the information   is of public concern and does not involve issues on national security or those that can adversely affect foreign relations, no one may be denied the information sought.

The Bill further defines information as:

any record, documents, papers, reports, letters, contracts, minutes and transcripts of official meetings, maps, books, photographs, data ,research materials, films. Sound and video recording, magnetic and other tapes, electronic data, computer stored data or materials recorded, stores or archived in whatever format, whether online or offline, which are made, received or kept in or under control and custody of any government office pursuant to law, executive order, and rules and regulation or in connection to the performance and transaction of official business by any government office

Furthermore, it also clarified the coverage of the Executive order stating that all the government offices under the executive branch, all government owned or government controlled corporations, state universities and colleges and all government units can be sources of the information sought.  Failure to provide the information sought may be grounds for administrative and disciplinary sanctions against any official or employee who fails to provide the information.

However, not all types and kinds of information may be sought even if the executive order grants it.   Every Filipino citizen has the right to whatever information he might need provided that it does not fall under the identified exemptions by the Department of Justice and of the Office of the Solicitor General.

The main purpose of the Freedom of Information is to provide transparency in government proceeding, expenditures and transactions to ensure that the people know that the government is properly working for them.  This also makes those in government accountable of their actions.  But one may ask, what is the implication of all these?

One of the things that the government must look into is the access itself to the information, meaning a system must be put in place to facilitate data sharing.  This also means that a network of updated information must be made readily available without having to be physically present at the office where the information may be sought.  The freedom of Information is an important step towards making the Philippines embrace open data standards and it puts pressure on agencies to facilitate the public sharing of data, data which in the first place have been made public even if no one is really asking or looking for it.

 This then means that there is a need to standardize procedures, formats and process to make accessing the information faster.  As of today, there are still issues of concern on access to information due to varying protocols on access  to documents.  For example, at the Department of Public Works and Highways, information about on-going projects may be readily available but the details of contracts are withheld.  One may attempt to ask for it but would require tons of request letters and will go through a lot of red tape without any guarantee whether the request might be granted or not.  Writer from the Philippine Center for Journalism shared this experience:

At present, agencies and offices follow their own system — or at least a semblance of it — of responding to information requests. On a fairly good day, a letter-request may no longer be required from an office that would automatically provide data — i.e., education or health statistics — because these are readily available.

However, on most days, obtaining a document — specifically those pertaining to expenditures, contracts, or the use of taxpayer’s money — would require sending a letter to, say, a bureau director who will forward it to the head of office who would in turn refer the request back to the director because he has the papers being requested. There is no guarantee that the request will be approved, or if complete documents will be released. ( Karlo Ilagan)

      

In the Senate, the copy of the Senator’s Statement of Assets, Liabilities and Net Worth are readily available for photocopy at the Office of the Senate Secretary but at the House of Representatives individual request letter must first be provided by the person seeking a copy of their SALN’s, and with it an explanation on why the person needs it or a justification on why he should be provided a copy when in the first place SALNs are public documents that anyone should have access to.

Speaking of SALN’s, access to the resources, properties and wealth of elected officials and government employees would give the people  ideas if these people are living within their means so as not to cast any doubt about their integrity and also to safeguard against conflict of interest and corruption.

Now that the FOI has been signed, what might be the implication of this act or the direct effect if people have access to information?  Here are just some of them: 

1. People are given another weapon to scrutinize the credibility and capacity of those who would like to seek public office

 2.  If the people know about the programs sponsored by their representatives in Congress which are funded by their taxes the people would be able to know what services they can avail of and hence facilitate in the evaluation and monitoring of the said projects.

  3. If people the people are informed of the priority projects of their government,  they take an active role during public consultation on these projects and not just mere observers.

However with the enactment of the Freedom of Information Bill, there are some issues of concern.  First is, regarding issue of privacy. Some advocates said that privacy is not really an issue since the information that will be accessed by the public are those which should be made public in the first place and secondly, that these information or the access to it should be based on public interest and should not be used to forward individual personal aims.  

The next issue is that private information may be inadvertently leak due to weak cyber security practices therefore making it susceptible to misuse. Third,  the government may find loopholes in the law to evade opening up crucial data to the public, or make such data available but very difficult to access due to red tape hence defeating the purpose of the law. 

Fourth would be a concern regarding its coverage, since the EO only covers the Executive branch of the government, many would like to think and explore its implications on the Legislative and Judiciary branch of the government

Since the Freedom of Information has only been in effect for less than a year, its implications are not yet that felt.  Sure, it is a work in progress but let us not forget the fact that it took almost three decades for it to become a reality, it is  in its infancy  and we are only starting to use it to our advantage when in fact other countries have been enjoying this privilege for more than a century. Let’s give it time, and then maybe in the near future it will prove effective in its mandate. It is a first step to truly making public documents readily available for the public and public use hopefully towards shaping  a better informed citizenry.