Are we crazy to be working on FOI in Turkey? (Clue: No)
While other issues in Turkey are taking the headlines, ARTICLE 19, Punto24 and many others are continuing the struggle for basic rights
28.09.2015
The Islamic State is next door. PKK (Kurdish militant organization based in Turkey and Iraqi Kurdistan) is in the house, and the military is doing God-only-knows-what in Cizre. So who cares about the Turkish Freedom of Information (FOI) law?
ARTICLE 19 does.
We are working with Turkish partner Punto24 to strengthen the right to information in Turkey, because we know, from experience, that the struggle for democracy and transparency is a long-term project, and that much of it takes place behind the scenes.
While political change can involve more dramatic action like protest, it quite often also involves a long, hard struggle for reform through training for civil society, journalists, and officials, and occasional strategic litigation. Sometimes change requires confrontation and protest and at other times it involves quietly training information officers on how to answer requests within the law. It's not glamorous, and it's not flashy but it's crucial.
After the latest crisis has passed, Turkey will still need to strengthen the basic foundations of its democracy: the power relationship between citizens and government. The right to information is one of the building blocks of democracy. It enables a healthy power balance between the people and government. Turkey strives to be democratic and has many of the characteristics of a healthy democracy, including free elections and an FOI law. In other important areas it falls short, such as media freedom and proper implementation of the FOI law.
There is an election coming in November – how will citizens make informed choices about public policies when they can't know with any accuracy what their government is doing? How fair is an election in the middle of a crisis with no free reporting? What about when opposition media get attacked, prosecuted or fired?
States sometimes use crises to introduce unreasonable limits on free expression and the right to know – concerned citizens must push back!
ARTICLE 19 IN TURKEY
Journalists struggle to carry out investigative work that is critical of the government for a variety of reasons in Turkey: mainstream media outlets in the country are owned by large conglomerates with close ties to the government. The relationship between media outlets and the government leads to the sacking of critical journalists, media blackouts, and closure of social media networks on issues that are critical of the government.
Many journalists lack capacity to submit and follow up on FOI requests – there is currently no central place online where people can find information about the RTI law and understand how to use it.
Even where journalists may have the skills to submit requests, this is undermined by a weak culture of transparency within government departments. This is partly due to a lack of training for public officials on implementation of the RTI law, but there is also frequently a lack of transparency on topics deemed sensitive by the state, but which would not classify as legitimate exemptions to the RTI law.
As a result, while the Right to Information Act is used by citizens, the quality of the responses is low and information officers in official bodies frequently lack training in how to respond to information requests.
This lack of transparency in decision-making and challenges in accessing information on issues such as democratic reform, urban regeneration and abortion practices in government-funded hospitals further affects journalists in their work, by preventing them from accessing information for writing critical or informative pieces that would enable them to spark public debate or act as whistleblowers.
ARTICLE 19 will build pressure on the government to enforce proper implementation of the law through publicity campaigns, training of government institutions to raise awareness of obligations under the law and training for journalists on how to submit requests for information and appeal refusals, including through the courts. We will call for proper implementation of the law, ultimately improving the free flow of information, and enabling citizens to hold their government to account.
While other issues in Turkey are taking the international headlines, ARTICLE 19, Punto24 and many other civil society activists are continuing the struggle for basic rights and freedoms, without which peaceful solutions to conflict are unobtainable.