Senators want Freedom of Information policy free of red tape

MANILA, Philippines — Senators on Monday expressed support for the enactment of a Freedom of Information law that would compel government agencies to provide readily available information on their websites, removing bureaucratic layers in the process of records requests.

Sen. Robinhood Padilla, chairperson of the public information and mass media committee, and Sen. Raffy Tulfo both stressed the need to free the public from having to fill out multiple forms to access government information.

“That should be automatic. Once they press (a button), the information should be there,” Padilla said in Filipino during the revived discussions of Senate bills proposing the long-sought-after FOI Act.

The FOI has been pending in Congress for more than three decades and previously passed final reading at the Senate during the 16th Congress. However, its counterpart measure stalled in the House of Representatives and failed to make it to plenary. 

Current FOI policy limited to executive branch

There is already an existing FOI policy in the government that covers only agencies in the executive branch through Executive Order No. 2 s. 2016, which was enacted during the term of then-President Rodrigo Duterte.

The order directs every government agency in the executive branch to prepare its own FOI manual with the Philippine Communications Office (PCO) as the lead implementing agency.

Padilla said that passing a law would strengthen the coverage of FOI by including all agencies from all government branches. Its implementation would also be funded through annual appropriations.

Tulfo said that there should be a measure that bypasses the current process of making a records request, which involves filling out government forms and a wait of up to two weeks.

“There should be a website wherein with a single push of a button, all information will be shown. We should do away with the unnecessary forms,” Tulfo said in Filipino.

According to EO No. 2, persons seeking information must submit a written request to the relevant government agency and wait for at most 15 working days.  

‘It’s about that we make a law to bypass this procedure, wherein anyone that would like to access information – such as salaries, government contracts, money – can read that instantly,” Tulfo added. 

SALN transparency 

Tulfo also raised concerns about government officials who fail to declare their Statement of Assets, Liabilities, and Net Worth (SALN) but are not penalized.

PCO said that a government official has yet to be charged for failure to file their SALN. At this, Tulfo said the current FOI policy is limited in penalizing those who deliberately hide or misdeclare their SALN. 

"We will only know that a government official does not file their SALN if the Ombudsman receives a complaint. Now, if no one makes a complaint, does that mean they can get away with it?" Tulfo said. 

Representatives of PCO said that this underscores the need for the public to fill up forms when making requests.

“Without a (written) request, we will have no basis to notify and request that information from the (Office of the Ombudsman,” the PCO said.

Reports by the Philippine Center for Investigative Journalism in 2020 and 2021 show that the Office of the Ombudsman restricted access to SALN documents of Duterte. His 2017 SALN was the last that was made public.

A 2020 memorandum from the Office of the Ombudsman only allowed SALNs to be granted to the requester if they were the official who filed the SALN, acting on a court order in relation to a pending case, or working under the Office of the Ombudsman's Field Investigation Office.