OCTOBER 14, 2008 Freedom Forum would like to voice its serious concern over the zero culture of information in Nepal. In view of promoting this culture, the Forum is all set to speed up the practice of right to information (RTI) in line with the RTI Act-2007 and international standards.
Keeping in mind that the RTI Act grants every Nepali citizen the right to access information held by the public bodies, advocates duo Krishna Pokharel and Rishee Ram Ghimire on behalf of Freedom Forum filed an application in the Office of Prime Minister and Council of Ministers on September 5, 2008 demanding that the official copy of the report of the commission formed to probe the killing of CPN-UML candidate from Surkhet district, constituency-1, Rihsi Prasad Sharma be made public. The government formed the probe commission on the premiership of Judge of Surkhet District Court, Purswottam Parajuli to investigate into the incident that took place on the run up to CA elections.
In accordance with the RTI ACT-2007, Clause 2(E), advocates duo Pokharel and Ghimire on behalf of Freedom Forum filed another application in the Office of Prime Minister and Council of Ministers in the same day demanding the copy of the report of probe commission formed to investigate the killings of seven Nepali people in Dang district, Lamahi in course of election campaigning on April 10-the CA elections day. The probe commission headed by Judge of Appellate Court, Rajbiraj, Govinda Kumar Shrestha submitted the report to the then Prime Minister on August 6. But both the reports have not yet been made public.
In this context, the Forum is officially going to appeal National Information Commission (NIC) against the culture of hiding information. It would also be a litmus test of NIC in this regard.
For more information,
Freedom Forum
monitoring@freedomforum.org.np
01-4102030/ 4102022