House urged to deliberate freedom of information bill
Kurniawan Hari, The Jakarta Post, Jakarta
A coalition for freedom of information has urged the House of Representatives (DPR) to start deliberating the bill on public access to information that the government submitted in March.
Coalition chairman Agus Sudibyo expressed fears on Friday that the deliberation of the political and antiterrorism bills would further delay discussion of the freedom of information bill.
Agus said a freedom of information law would provide a solid basis for the country's corruption eradication drive.
"The eradication of corruption will never take place as long as there is no free access to information," Agus argued.
Agus was briefing the press after a meeting with legislators from the Reform faction in the House. The meeting was part of the coalition's roadshow to convince legislators to start deliberating the long-overdue freedom of information bill immediately.
The coalition consists of about 30 non-governmental organizations (NGOs), including the Alliance of Independent Journalists, Center for Electoral Reform, Indonesian Conference on Religion and Peace, Indonesian Corruption Watch, Indonesian Center for Environmental Law, Legal Aid Institute, Transparency International Indonesia, and others.
By Friday, the coalition had met legislators from the Golkar Party, the United Development Party (PPP), and the National Awakening Party (PKB).
"Most factions promised to follow up on our arguments," Agus said.
Reform faction legislator Samuel Koto said that his faction took the same view as the coalition.
Whether or not the bill on public access to information would be deliberated immediately, he said, would depend on the opinion of the other factions in the House.
Samuel said legislators were currently busy working on the deliberation of various bills, including the political party, general elections and antiterrorism bills.
"Probably, we will be able to start discussing the bill on freedom of information in January at the earliest" Samuel added.
The freedom of information bill was submitted to a plenary session on March 11.
The bill consists of 10 chapters, 61 articles and a number of appendices. It includes the right to inspect documents, the right to attend all public meetings, the right to obtain photocopies of documents, the right to general information and the right to disseminate information.
The bill also deals with information that would be restricted to the public at large. Such information includes anything that could interfere with law enforcement, the protection of property rights and business competition.
Information that could disturb security, the defense of the state and privacy would also be off-limits.