SOME agencies of government are frustrating Nigerians’ access to public information by denying requests made under the Freedom for Information Act (FOIA), 2011.

The Act not only requires agencies of government to make proactive disclosures of public information but also to provide access to citizens whenever they request for them within seven days.

However, several agencies of the federal and some state governments have blocked access to important public information to the International Centre for Investigative Reporting (ICIR), thus frustrating a key project meant to promote accountability in procurement processes, the Open Contract Reporting, OCR Project.

This project brings together over a hundred journalists in newsrooms across the country to scrutinise government contracts.

However, none of the FOIA requests sent to government agencies have received even an acknowledgment, let alone a response.

These agencies are the Niger Delta Development Commission (NDDC), National Primary Health Care Development Agency (NPHCDA), Ecological Fund Office (EFO), Association of Local Governments of Nigeria (ALGON), Federal Road Safety Corps (FRSC), Federal Ministry of Finance, Budget and National Planning and the Federal Ministry of Works and Housing.

Between August and October, The ICIR has filed 11 different FOIA requests to these agencies with no response from any of them.

The purpose of the request was to obtain procurement details of contracts approved by these agencies.

On August 18, The ICIR had requested that the NPHCDA should provide details of capital releases on the construction of primary health care centres (PHCs) in the FCT between 2016 and 2020.

It is over two months since filing this request but the newspaper is yet to either get a letter acknowledging the receipt of the request or the actual response to the request.

Again, on September 10, The ICIR filed another FOI request to the NPHCDA for the details of contractors who had gotten the contract to renovate existing primary health centres and construct new primary health centres in Anambra state. Of the several requests sent to the NPHCDA, this particular request was only responded to on November 11, a month after the request was made.

Section 4 of the FOI Act provides that public institutions shall within seven days of receiving applications make the information available to the applicant. The ICIR is yet to get any response from the agency despite sending a reminder of the earlier application to the agency on September 21.

On October 2 and October 5, The ICIR requested for the details of contracts and contractors approved for road construction/rehabilitation in Edo and Abia states respectively,  NDDC also is yet to respond.

On October 7, an FOIA request was also sent to the Ecological Funds Office, EFO, requesting for details of its funded projects in South Eastern Nigeria between 2015 and 2020. More than a month after the filing, the request is still pending as the EFO has refused to respond.

Another FOIA request was submitted to the NPHCDA on October 14 to produce details of primary healthcare projects in Kunchi and Lamba areas of Kano state, but the NPHCDA, a serial defaulter, has refused to respond to the request.

October 28, The ICIR sent another FOIA request to the Association of Local Governments of Nigeria, ALGON, to provide details of primary healthcare projects in Kunchi area of Kano state.

Further, The ICIR sent requests to the FRSC, Federal Ministry of Finance, Budget and National Planning, and the Federal Ministry of Works and Housing.

Only the FRSC has sent an acknowledgment copy confirming the receipt of the request, while others are have not responded as of the time fillingthis repor for publication.

In compliance with the FOI Act, most of these agencies are notorious for denying the public information at their disposal. The FOIA compliance ranking carried out by the Public and Private Development Centre (PPDC), Right To Know (R2K), International Centre for Investigative  Reporting (ICIR), Media Rights  Agenda (MRA),  Basic  Rights Watch (BRW) and Budgit also confirm this.

In the latest 2020 FOIA compliance ranking, the NPHCDA ranked 200th, one of the worst offenders. In 2019, the agency ranked 29th out of 141. In 2018, the agency came last as it ranked 82nd and in 2017, it ranked 52nd with no proactive disclosure of information. For the Ecological Fund Office, it ranked 71st in 2020 and came last in 2019, 2018, and 2017 rankings.

What the FOI Act says

Nigeria’s access to information law was signed to law in 2011 by former President Goodluck Jonathan and, since then, all requests for information received by a public institution.

Sections 1 and 2 of the FOIA establish the right of any person to apply for information or records in the possession of a public institution. Generally, these rights are:

• The right to access or request any information or record that is in the custody or possession of any public institution or private bodies providing public services, performing public functions or utilising public funds.
• The right to be told whether the information or record exists.
• The right to have the requested information or record released if the information or record is in the custody or possession of a public institution.
• The right not to demonstrate any specific interest or purpose in the requested information or record.
• The right to receive information that public institutions are obliged to proactively disclose under the Act.
• The right to take legal action in Court to compel any public institution to comply with the provisions of the Act, including discharging their proactive disclosure obligations under the Act.

Section 29 of the FOI Act obligates every public institution must submit its annual report on or before February 1 of each year to the AGF on all applications of FOI request they received.