Ghana Web: Ghana: Thursday, November 15, 2018.
Speaker of Parliament Professor Aaron
Mike Oquaye has given the strongest indication yet that parliament will pass
the Right to Information (RTI) Bill into an Act by close of 2018.
Professor Oquaye disclosed this at a
media engagement with some selected journalists in Accra on Monday, November
12.
According to the Speaker, Parliament is
focused on passing the Bill; hence, it will do all it can for the Bill to be
passed before the year ends.
“The Right to Information Bill will be a
thing of the past by end of this year. I can assure you, it will be done,” he
stressed.
“The budget will come, we will deal with
the budget, and at the same time RTI will be a thing of the past by the end of
this year,” Professor Mike Oquaye assured.
There have been many concerns raised
about the failure on the part of successive Parliaments to pass the RTI bill
into law to allow citizens, most importantly, journalists get access to
information regarding state issues.
The RTI Bill has been before Parliament
for over a decade, with all attempts to get the Bill passed failing.
Journalists across the country have been
at the forefront of crusade to getting the RTI enacted, as it is very crucial
to their work as people who serve as a link between government and the masses.
Pushing this agenda under an umbrella
body, ‘Media Coalition on RTI’, the group has written several petitions and
embarked on demonstrations to register their disappointment in Parliament for
not passing the Bill.
On October, 30, 2018, the Coalition
stormed the premises of Parliament to get the legislators to place premium on
ratifying the Bill, but they were prevented from entering the main chamber for
wearing branded T-Shirts.
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