Fri, 5 Sept 2025

The Editor,

The Freedom of Information Act 1999 (FoIA) is part of what I call the “RLM Suite” of Legacy Policy – reforms championed during the tenure of then-AG Ramesh Lawrence Maharaj. That suite included the FoIA, the Judicial Review law, the activation of the Integrity Commission, the Prevention of Corruption Act and the Proceeds of Crime Act. Together they represented a deliberate attempt to empower citizens and hold public institutions accountable.

I chose the phrase ‘Legacy Policy’ to denote a particular type of law which it is all but impossible to reverse, due to its manifest good sense and popularity. So, although our Courts have widely recognised the transformative concepts at the heart of the FoIA, with leading rulings now cited internationally, with approval, as examples of progressive jurisprudence, there is still a deep dis-ease with the very Freedom of Information, at the political level.

The Act requires that Annual Reports on the operation of the FoIA be laid in Parliament, so that there could be some proper record of how this important facet of our Republic was operating. Yet, notwithstanding its parentage, just after the 2010 elections, the Freedom of Information Unit was moved to the Office of the Prime Minister, then onto Foreign Affairs (?) then the Communications Ministry. So those Annual Reports were last published in 2009, and this switch took place during the PP government, within which the UNC was the leading element.

But PNM was not to be left behind in these tactics of delay and obstruction to the fundamental democratic rights of Freedom of Information, since in 2019 there was a short-lived attempt under then-AG Faris Al Rawi to dilute the Act by extending response times to six months and so on. A short sharp campaign was mounted to confront this threat, so those proposals were quietly withdrawn.

Equally damaging are the quieter, ongoing tactics of delay and obstruction. Ministries and state agencies routinely frustrate and delay requests. In terms of my own ongoing research, since February 2025 I have been dealing with an ever-retreating timeline from NGC for information on legal fees and technical/commercial details for the Beetham Water Recycling Plant (BWRP). Partners at expensive law firms are engaged to explain the delays and promise the requested details, but those were to have been delivered over 3 months ago. While deploying the delaying tactics, NGC published details of those BWRP legal fees with this astonishing quote from NGC Chairman, Gerald Ramdeen –  “There will be no secrecy under this board,” he added. “Any request for information will be met and information disclosed.” Well I tell you eh.

It is precisely at this stage that the FoIA ought to be revised and strengthened. The law must be modernised to ensure compliance, curb abuse, and enforce real-time accountability. But revision must avoid the errors of the past. If a newly elected UNC government wishes to do better, it must act differently from the PNM before it.

The promise of the “RLM Suite” was never meant to gather dust. It was meant to anchor transparency in our democratic life. Whether we advance or abandon that legacy is now the question before us.

Afra Raymond
afraraymond.net