Editorial
RTI Act in the final stage
Implementing it will be the real challenge
The announcement by the Chief Adviser that the formulation of the RTI act is in the final stages is very welcome indeed. The Chief Adviser could not have chosen a better forum than the Ekushey Boi Mela, to give us the good news, since books have a very important role in shaping the national thought processes by keeping us informed.
It has been almost six years that the government set about formulating a RTI through a working paper drafted by the Law Commission, but the public had very little idea about the status of the matter till the CA's statement.
The need for such an act for Bangladesh has been articulated by the members of the civil society for a long time. Its benefits have been propounded at many forums, but merits further repetition. The much needed transparency, particularly financial, which has been the prime reason for propelling our country to the top bracket of the most corrupt countries in the world, will be infused in all government activities. It will certainly make public office holders accountable to the people.
It needs to be mentioned that many of the SAARC countries have enacted the RTI Act. India, for example, passed the Bill in 2005, with very stringent provisions for its enforcement. Nepal has had this law since Aug 2007, while Pakistan was the first in the region in this regard, having passed the Act in 2002.
However, the people in Bangladesh are still in the dark about the substance of the draft act. Since the initial drafting of it in 2002 some effort has been made to elicit public opinion on it. It is to the credit of the present caretaker government that the draft will see the light of the day, very soon one hopes. But there is just one issue that we would like to urge the government to take into consideration. While the RTI Act should be formulated and all preparations made to implement it, there is a strong rationale for giving wide publicity to the draft in order to incorporate public input into it, more so when the forum for debate on such issues, the parliament, is absent at the moment.
We believe that enactment of RTI Act will go a long way in strengthening democracy in Bangladesh. That is one thing that the current government had expressed their commitment to. Now is the time to fulfill that.
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