Bakery expenses, gifts

ISLAMABAD: A top bureaucrat has told the Punjab Information Commission that details of Governor House bakery expenses and gifts could not be shared with public as the oath of governor does not allow disclosure of such information.
However, the commission, in its unanimous order issued Tuesday rejected the exemption claimed by the deputy secretary Governor House and directed him to provide the requested information by October 23.
“I will not directly or indirectly communicate or reveal to any person any matter which shall be brought under my consideration or shall become known to me as governor of the province of Punjab except as may be required for the discharge of my duties as governor,” Deputy Secretary Tariq Shahzad quoted the oath as the basis for his refusal to provide information about month-wise bakery expenditure of the Governor House and information about gifts/presents given by governor to people from August 1, 2013 to August 2014.
Tariq Shahzad, who is also designated public information officer (PIO) of the Governor House, presented his arguments during a hearing before the Punjab Information Commission.
The Commission had summoned the PIO to explain his failure in provision of information to a citizen under the Punjab Transparency and Right to Information Act 2013. The original information request was filed by the citizen on September 18, 2014 but the same could not be provided even after 13 months.
“The commission is not convinced that the above-referred part of the oath of the governor can be used to claim exemption from the purview of Article 19 A of the Constitution or the provisions of the Punjab Transparency and Right to Information Act 2013, which was assented by the Governor himself without expressing any reservations,” the commission said in its order signed by Chief Information Commissioner Mazhar Hussain Minhas and two information commissioners Mukhtar Ahmad Ali and Ahmad Raza Tahir.
The order further states that in fact the governor is duty bound to disclose information, when it is required by the Constitution or law.“The insistence of the office of the Governor on maximum secrecy, as evident from the responses, not only disregards the explicit provisions of the Act but is also in deviation from the spirit of a democratic order, wherein information must flow freely to inform and empower the voters, who are the real and the ultimate stakeholders in the affairs of the state,” the order says.
In a classic bureaucratic style, the PIO gave several excuses for non-provision of information about the Governor House expenses but the commission rejected all the arguments and advised the chief secretary of the Government of Punjab to constitute a committee of senior officers and other stakeholders to review and then develop recommendations for the amendment of laws, rules and manuals contradictory to the provisions of the Punjab RTI law and which create confusion in the minds of public information officers.
The commission also directed the secretary to the governor to establish an online Management Information System (MIS) for, among others, budget management, procurement and representations filed against the recommendations of Ombudsmen.
“Such a system should ensure easy data management and retrieval, and include features of public access to, inter alia, final orders of the governor and budget utilisation,” the order said. The commission also heard two separate complaints against the Governor House regarding non-provision of information and directed the PIO to share the information.
The PIO argued that, under Article 19 A of the Constitution, the right to information is restricted to matters of “public importance” and it is further subject to “regulation and reasonable restrictions imposed by law.” In this regard, the PIO relied upon the judgment of the Supreme Court passed in the Constitutional Petition No. 5 of 2013 titled Dr Muhammad Tahirul Qadri Vs. Federation of Pakistan. The commission was of the view that the apex court judgment was primarily and specifically about the question of admissibility of petitions directly filed in the Supreme Court under Article 184(3) of the Constitution. Since in case of such petitions, the petitioners directly approach the Supreme Court to invoke its original jurisdiction without first exhausting other remedies available through the judicial system, it is logical and necessary that not only a specific meaning is ascribed to the term but also a higher threshold or a stringent criteria for determining ‘public importance’ is established.
The commission held that while interpreting the term “public importance” in the context of Article 19 A of the Constitution, it has to be kept in mind that right to information is now universally recognised as a human right, which can be exercised to access information about matters of individual, community or public interest.
“In fact, in a democratic society wherein fundamental rights of each individual are guaranteed, the right to information serves as an enabler or as a pre-requisite in the realisation of other fundamental rights,” it added.
The PIO also argued that the requested information cannot be provided in view of Articles 6 & 7 of the Qanun-e-Shahadat Order 1984 and the Official Secret Act 1923, which are federal laws and, in terms of Article 143 of the Constitution, prevail over the provincial laws. However, the commission rejected the assertion saying that provisions of Qanun-e-Shahadat Order 1984 are about the presentation of evidence in the courts of law and, hence, are not relevant to the disclosure of information to the general public under the Punjab Transparency and Right to Information Act 2013.
“As for the Official Secrets Act 1923 is concerned, it doesn’t specifically list documents, which are to be treated as secret, and instead leaves such a function to be performed through other statutes or rules enacted or notified by the respective federal or a provincial government,” the order reads.