RTI: You can request information from the Presidency without limitation – Executive Secretary

Executive Secretary of the Right To Information (RTI) Commission, Mr Yaw Sarpong Boateng, has said persons can request information from all public offices including the seat of government, without limitation.

He however stated that in the case of the Presidency, if the information being requested is yet to be utilized by cabinet or by the President and the Vice, the person seeking it would probably have to wait for it to be used first by the Presidency.

Otherwise, he added, it will prejudice the deliberation process.

He intimated that the law requires that citizens who demand information should be given without hinderance.

Mr Boateng said these in an interview with Berla Mundi on TV3 Tuesday September 20.

“You can require information from the presidency, there are no limitations except that if you ask for say, a memo that is yet to be utilized by Cabinet or by the President or by the Vice President then you would probably have to wait for it to have been used.

“Otherwise if you take it before it is used, you will prejudice the deliberative process of the decision making,” he said.

Mr Boateng further explained that the information at the bosom of officials in public institutions belong to the people hence, they should be given if requested.

This is what the 1991 Constitution and also the RTI law demand, he added.

Speaking in an interview with Berla Mundi on TV3’s New Day show on Tuesday September 20, Mr Boateng stated that “No public institution is exempt from the application of this law except of course the national archives and the museums which actually give out the information anyway.

“Apart from the ones which give out anyway, no one is exempt which means the office of the President is not exempt, National Security is not exempt except that it is not every information they can put out.

“The fact that you are national security does not exempt you from the application of this law because the information belongs to the people  and that is what the Constitution recognizes.”

source:3news