MEDIA Rights Agenda (MRA) has commended Nigeria’s House of Representatives for its proposals aimed at strengthening the Freedom of Information (FOI) Act, 2011.

The proposals which were made on Tuesday, June 24, by the Reps Speaker, Tajudeen Abbas aim at improving compliance by public institutions with the FOI Act and ensuring its effective implementation.

In a statement sent to The ICIR on Wednesday, June 25 and signed by its communications officer, Idowu Adewale, MRA described the proposals as “a renewed opportunity to institutionalise transparency in public affairs and strengthen citizens’ trust in Government.”

It also commended the Speaker’s call for mandatory and enforceable budgeting for FOI compliance by all Ministries, Departments, and Agencies (MDAs) of government.

It noted that during the annual appropriation process, the organisation urged the National Assembly to take urgent and concrete steps to implement the proposals.

The MRA’s deputy executive director, Ayode Longe, further commended the Speaker for his “clear recognition of the critical role that access to information plays in ensuring transparency, accountability, and participatory governance.”

“We consider his proposals, which are in total alignment with similar recommendations by Media Rights Agenda over the years, to be a timely and important step towards addressing the persistent culture of secrecy and non-compliance that has undermined the effectiveness of the FOI Act for over a decade,” Longe said.

The Speaker had on Tuesday at the opening ceremony of a workshop titled ‘Upholding Accountability and Transparency in Governance: A Comprehensive Review of FOIA Law for Public and Corporate Organizations’, assured that the 10th House of Reps might consider FOI compliance as a condition for budgetary considerations for MDAs that are reluctant to FOI Act compliance.

Longe had decried that the financial allocations for FOI-related activities in the Federal Government’s budget, which is less than 0.0005 per cent of the national budget, are negligible and unacceptable.

“We are in complete agreement with the Right Honourable Speaker that transparency cannot be treated as a marginal expense, which is consistent with the point we made in our report titled ‘A Vote Against Transparency: A Report on Allocations for Freedom of Information Implementation in 2025 Federal Budget’, released on January 15, 2025.

“We are particularly encouraged by the Speaker’s acknowledgement that many public institutions fail to implement the FOI Act due to a lack of dedicated resources,” the MRA deputy director said.

He also said the Speaker’s recommendation that compliance with the FOI Act should be institutionalised through budgetary provisions is a practical and impactful intervention that aligns with international best practices on open governance.

He believes that the Speaker’s proposals, if implemented, will ensure resources are allocated specifically for the setting up of FOI units or desks in public institutions; staff training on implementation of the Act and proactive disclosure obligations; the proper maintenance of records, including digitisation, as well as preparing and submitting mandatory annual FOI compliance reports.

“We urge the National Assembly to take concrete legislative and oversight measures to actualise the Speaker’s proposals. These could include amending relevant appropriation regulations, guidelines or practices to include FOI compliance lines and incorporating performance indicators tied to transparency, proactive disclosures and responsiveness to requests for information,” Longe said.

He argued that an effective implementation of the FOI Act should not be simply a legal obligation but a governance imperative, with the Speaker’s proposals providing a renewed opportunity to institutionalise transparency and strengthen citizens’ trust in Government.

Longe noted MRA and other civil society organisations have consistently drawn attention to the MDA’s reluctance to honour FOI Act requests.

The ICIR has, in several reports, documented how the government and its agencies flout the FOI Act without recourse to the law.