Prez Akufo-Addo sets yet another timeline for anti-corruption missing link, RTI Bill

Prez Akufo-Addo has indicated that the Right to Information Bill, described as a key ingredient for the successful fight against corruption in public office, should be passed before the present parliament rises.

Describing the RTI as “one piece of the anti-corruption framework that is yet to be put in place”, he said the passage of the “Right to Information Bill would increase transparency, and add another critical weapon to the armoury in the fight against corruption.”

The Right to Information Bill remains to be passed into law since it was drafted in 1999 and making a number of visits to parliament following a number of reviews in 2003, 2005 and 2007.

It has outlived the administrations of J.A. Kufuor, J.E.A. Mills and John Mahama, who all gave indications they were all for it and desired to get it passed. It was not until February 5, 2010 when it was presented to Parliament.

But according to President Akufo-Addo, after many years of hesitation government intends to bring the Bill again to parliament and work to get it passed into law “before the end of this Meeting of Parliament.

“The protection of the public purse is a social common good, and it depends on all of us. It is in all our interest that corruption does not thrive, and we police each other’s behaviour. Going Beyond Aid means Ghanaians should not serve as fronts for foreign companies to defraud our country. It will mean we all pay our taxes, as provided by law, and it will mean we all help to take care of government property, as though it were our own.”