Staff Reporter :
At a round table on right to information jointly organized by Article 19; an international NGO with Daily Star and Equity and Justice Working Group Bangladesh (EquityBD) urged government to take a move at the United Nations to include the access to information in UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDG), which will replace Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) from 2015.
The roundtable title “Access to Information as Central to SDG” was moderated by Dr Salehuddin Ahmed, Managing Director of Daily star along with Tahmina Rahman, Country Director, Article 19 and Rezaul Karim Chowdhury, Chief Moderator, EquityBD.
at Daily Star conference room. Dr Shamsul Alam of Planning Commission, Mr. Nazrul Islam of Cabinet Division, Mrs. Sayeda Tasnim of Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Professor Sadeka Halim, Information Commissioner, Dr Iftekharuzzaman of TIB, Saheen Anam of Manusher Jonno Foundation (MJF), Dr Tofail Ahmed, Local Government Expert, Asgar Ali Sabri, of Action Aid, Monisha Biswas of Oxfam, Barrister Tanjibul Alam, Dr Akram Hossain ex Member of Parliament and Faruque Ahmed, Executive Editor of the New Nation took part in the discussion.
The discussants said right to information is central to Bangladesh’s proposal for SDGs at the UN process.
They said that the country losses 13.6 percent of budget and 2.4 percent of GDP due to corruption. But this could be minimized if government commits itself to right to information.
They held the view that access to information is key to holding government accountable and fight back misuse of public fund and corruption at high places. In this case, media must play pro active role to protect public interest. The discussants also talked about the hazards that newsmen face in reporting against corruption and vested interest groups.
Especially the conflicts of interest among different agencies and laws such as the Right to Information Act, ICT Act, ACC Act and TIB came up in the discussion. The discussants held the view that much of the progress achieved through some of these law were lost by ICT Act which can deny the ground of other laws to a large extent.
They also demanded that the Election Commission must publish the ‘eight information of all candidates’ especially of forthcoming Upazila election.
