On 28 September 2002 Freedom of Information organizations from various countries around the globe meeting in Sofia, Bulgaria, created a network of Freedom of Information Advocates(FOIA Network) and agreed to collaborate in promotion of the individual right of access to information and open, transparent governance. The group of FOI Advocates also proposed that 28 September be nominated as International Right to Know Day in order to symbolize the global movement for promotion of the right to information.
The aim of having a Right to Know Day is to raise awareness of the right to information. It is a day on which freedom of information activists from around the world can use further to promote this fundamental human right and to campaign for open, democratic societies in which there is full citizen empowerment and participation in government.
The right of access to information is an important human right, necessary for the enjoyment of other human rights. The right to information is essential for transparent and accountable government. The right of access to information makes possible the public involvement in formulating social policies and in the decision-making processes of governance. The right to information can only be effectively exercised and implemented on the basis of laws, regulating this right in accordance with international standards.
On the occasion of the International Right to Know Day, the European Ombudsman, Nikiforos Diamandouros, has called on the EU administration to be as transparent and citizen-friendly as possible. Speaking in an event he co-organised with Transparency International in Brussels, entitled "Transparency at the EU level and in the Member States", he pointed out that only if European citizens feel that the EU administration is transparent, accessible and accountable, will they develop the necessary trust and willingness actively to participate in the democratic life of the Union.
Basil Venitis muses that Transparency International(TI) kowtows to kleptocrats for consulting fees. TI Chair, Huguette Labelle, La Belle de Jour, TI chairwoman, rubs shoulders with kleptocrats, begging for fees! TI has deteriorated to a spindoctor of kleptocrats! TI itself is not transparent, but translucent, transformed to Translucency International!
More than one third of the Ombudsman's inquiries concern complaints about lack of transparency in the EU administration. Such complaints concern, for example, access to information or documents, the composition of working groups, or the institutions' policy making.
Diamandouros stressed the Lisbon Treaty provides for greater transparency in the activities of the EU administration. It requires the Council to meet in public when it deliberates on draft legislation and contains the citizens' right of access to documents of all EU institutions, bodies, offices and agencies, including, for the first time, the European Council. The Treaty also requires the EU administration to conduct its work as openly as possible, in order to promote good governance and the participation of civil society. Diamandouros is committed to informing citizens about their right to know what the EU administration is doing.
The Ombudsman also receives an increasing number of complaints that raise ethical concerns. They range from the question of what gifts EU officials may accept to the issue of revolving doors whereby former Commissioners or EU officials move to the private sector thereby running the risk of creating conflicts of interest. With a view to identifying best practices with regard to the fundamental ethical principles that should apply to EU officials, the Ombudsman recently launched a consultation with the national ombudsmen in the Member States.
Venitis asserts kleptocrats are absolutely shameless in trying to protect themselves and their colleagues from legitimate inquiry into their activities. Even though parliaments have passed a number of whistle-blower statutes to protect employees from retaliation when reporting the misdeeds of their superiors, the staff of parliaments, precisely the people who are most likely to know about political corruption, enjoy no such protection.
Kleprocrats have repeatedly tried to find constitutional ways of limiting the free speech of real and potential opponents. What is even more remarkable, kleptocrats are not content with just trying to protect themselves, but have gone so far as to try to protect corrupt foreign leaders from those who may wish to expose their wrongdoing.
Kleptocrats depend on elaborate mythologies to keep the people complacent in the face of constant attacks on their liberty, their property, and their lives. Kings used to proclaim that they ruled with divine approval, so disobedience to them was actually disobedience to God. That worked to keep most of the citizenry in line for a very long time. As religion started losing its hold over people, kleptocrats came up with many ideas. The most ridiculous idea was that the state was like a big, sheltering family where everyone had to cooperate for the common good, as directed by kleptocrats.
Basil Venitis, twitter.com/Venitis, points out the Ministry of Truth or Minitrue in Newspeak was how George Orwell described the mechanism used by government to control information in his seminal novel of 1984. Now, governments have been rocked by the power of the internet and are seeking to gain control of it so that they will have a virtual monopoly on information that the public is able to access. But there is no way Minitrue can gag the internet. Even mainstream media, Fourth Estate, have praised bloggers as the Fifth Estate. Clergy is the First Estate, nobility is the Second Estate, and commoners is the Third Estate.
With venitist Yahoo Groups, we're better off now that managers of kleptocratic offices where potential leakers dwell have one more reason to look over their shoulders. At some point, even the most stupid kleptocratic dinosaurs just might recognize that they're living in a new environment, one where kleptocrats are no more able to control the flow of embarrassing information than record companies can control the flow of digital music files. Thanks to the Internet, a new wave of grassroots journalists, and a global network of venitists, it's less risky than ever before to release incriminating information anonymously. The result will be a world where it's easier to expose misbehavior and to deter it.
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