People’s access to Right to Information (RTI) becomes all the more essential during a crisis.

This is what we experienced during 2015’s devastating earthquakes. At that time, people from 31 quake-affected districts, particularly those from the severely affected 14 districts, demanded all kinds of information, as was their right. But there were lapses in disseminating right information about relief materials. The government was accused of embezzling material and funds in the name of relief. That’s why we at the National Information Commission asked the Ministry of Home Affairs to disclose all details of relief materials like lentils, rice, oil, and tents and money, both in cash and pledges, every day at 4 pm. We asked them to disseminate right information so that the people themselves can evaluate how much relief the government is getting from various sources. The ministry, however, never publicized the information.

A similar situation has now emerged with the COVID-19 pandemic. A month ago, the prime minister informed the nation that Rs 18 billion had been spent so far to contain the spread of the coronavirus. Since then, people have sought details of the expenditure. Some have even argued that the people would benefit the most if that money had been divided and directly distributed to every household. Legally, every citizen has the right to question the government and seek information.  

Following this criticism, the prime minister stated the funds had been dispatched to 753 local governments, who could provide the expenditure details. But the local governments weren’t transparent and we did not fulfill our responsibility by asking them to be transparent to the citizens.

Going back to the COVID-19 crisis, the government has done some good jobs. For example, the Health Ministry’s spokesperson presents a national COVID-19 update every day. But the way the spokesperson presents the details raises questions about whether he is disseminating information or terrorising the people.   

Second, key offices of all offices, mainly those involved in preventing pandemics, are able to publicise the details of all expenses incurred during the pandemic. For them, this is a challenge as well as an opportunity. RTI law clearly states that key information should be disseminated every three months, so both federal and local governments should make their expenses public. People should know what the government is doing with their money. But since governments don’t disclose their expenditure details, they face facing criticism despite their good work.  

The importance of RTI has thus increased more than ever, but sadly, citizens’ pursuit of information has gone the opposite way.  

Our team was the second in office at the National Information Commission since its founding. The first team was more focused on institutional development but during our five-year tenure, we tried our best to expand to all 77 districts and spread awareness to local bodies about constitutionally guaranteed rights like the right to information. We made it mandatory to appoint an information officer at all government offices. Except for a few exceptions, most offices followed our instructions. However, the tendency to guard information that might potentially harm public officials continues.

Not many citizens are seeking information, either. I think about 10 percent of the total population understands that RTI is their fundamental right while only two or three percent exercise this right. Thus, it is difficult to implement the law until people are aware and apply it in practice.  

During my time at the commission, I wanted to do three things: promulgate an RTI law in all seven provinces, conduct research about our work performance during our five year stay in office, and begin a massive campaign to disseminate information regarding state-provided facilities for women. Sadly, I was unable to do it all. We are already a federal country but only Kathmandu has an information commission. This isn’t the way to expand people’s access to information.  

As part of making women more aware about women-specific facilities provided by the state, we prepared a booklet in seven different languages and disseminated it. But it wasn’t possible to reach out to all local governments and make women aware about their legal rights. We also published a book about the changes made possible because of the right to information. We had high expectations from the media, but the media fraternity made little effort in exercising RTI. Although right to information is every citizen’s law, media persons could effectively exercise it in practice.

When we analysed reasons behind the low participation of journalists in using RTI tool to get information, we learned that there’s a tendency to collecting information from backdoor channels or through personal relations instead of filing a petition as per the law.

Nevertheless, we have made some progress in the field of right to information. But in our context, law implementation is weak. This applies to all sectors, not just in the field of RTI. When we held discussions with RTI commissioners and experts from countries like Australian, Japan, the USA, and Canada, they told us that their law had a more limited mandate than ours. Still, they said there were few problems in information dissemination while we have many. This shows that we are smart when it comes to promulgating laws but poor in implementation.  

There are also institutional problems. For example, bureaucrats simultaneously take an oath of office and secrecy and an oath to implement the constitution and the country’s laws. But once they take charge, they seem to forget their oath taken to implement the law and only focus on maintaining secrecy. Based on conversations with information officers, I can say that they feel more comfortable hiding information instead of assisting RTI applicants. More importantly, politicians who want to hide information during their time in power seek the same information once they are not in power anymore. For RTI, this is a tragedy.

But this is not to say that we shouldn’t stop questioning the authorities and asking for information. Right information will promote transparency, rule of law, and accountability.

Yashoda Timsina is a former commissioner of the National Information Commission