BuaNews (Tshwane)
Seshoane Masitha
2 February 2004
Cape Town — Dialogue continues to ensure openness and transparency in South Africa.
This is according to Dr Leon Wessels, who is responsible for the right to access of information in the SA Human Rights Commission (SAHRC).
Dr Wessels was speaking at the second International Conference of Information Commissioners held at the Mount Nelson Hotel here today.
Delegates from 14 countries have converged at the annual conference, organised by the SAHRC, under the theme "entrenching the right to freedom of information: international cooperation".
Countries participating in the two-day conference include Mexico, Mozambique, Hungary, Portugal, France, Ireland, India, Sweden, Scotland, the USA, Britain, Canada and South Africa.
Dr Wessels told the conference the commission had the duty to monitor the implementation of the Promotion of Access to Information Act and make sure that government departments and private bodies met their obligations in terms of the law.
In this regard, he said the commission was obliged to present an annual report to Parliament.
"We have traveled a long distance because we have constitutional and legislative provisions but there is clearly not a culture of openness and transparency. The lack of participation by private and public bodies displays that," Dr Wessels said.
Dr Wessels said public bodies were required by law to report to the commission annually on how they complied with the Act.
"Public bodies go beyond government departments, it is everybody that is governed by statutes and receives public money. It is national, provincial, local government and parastatals," Dr Wessels said.
He said the SAHRC was continuously engaging government and private organisation in debates around access to information.
"It is in our normal nature of work. Right now we have a complainant who claims that a certain government department is not disclosing information to him which he believe he deserves," he said.
He added that the commission was in polite dialogue with government on the right to access information.
".....like democracy there is never a finish line," he said.
"It is not a clash as such but it is a battle. The right says there should be open government and there should be access to information and not giving information is an exception not the rule," Dr Wessels said.
Dr Wessels said the SAHRC would table its annual report to Parliament in June.
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