Photo: Garba Abari, DG NOA
By Ihechi Enyinnaya
The National Orientation Agency(NOA) is to begin another round of sensitization on the Freedom of Information Act (FOI Act) to educate Nigerians on the importance of exploiting the full provisions of the Act.
In a chat with newsmen in Abuja, Mr Elisha Sabo, Director, Reform, Cordination, and Service Improvement, (NOA) Headquarters, said the sensitization programme would avail Nigerians the opportunity to properly study the FOI Act as well as take advantages of the provisions in their interventions and interface with government agencies, ministries and parastatals.
He said: “In the past we have carried out sensitization activities concerning the FOI Act. But the feedback we get from the survey and programmes indicate that many Nigerians are yet to fully take advantage of the provisions of the Act, chosing rather to limit themselves to issues of corruption and contracts.
“Most of the areas people ask questions is to make request for issues of contracts, issues of finances of agencies and organizations, not knowing that it goes beyond that, that there are so many areas in which you can access information.
Dani said the agency has gone very far in its efforts to educate Nigerians on the FOI Act.
“We have printed a booklet, with so many Nigerian languages for anybody to know about freedom of information act.
“And we have gone to the grassroots, which I was privileged to be in the states and I know the level of interface we have had with people on this Freedom of Information Act.
“We received a training at Lagos, and when we came back, we assemble all our local government officers, we trained them and they went back to their LGAs and trained their staffs.
“NOA has War Against Indiscipline committees, we trained them to train people on their own local languages.
“The level at which this thing has gone is very far. I want to assure you that the agency has gone to various levels to enlighten people on this issue of freedom of information,” he said.
On how the agency measures the level of response from the people, Mr Sabo said the agency has a department that is in charge of carrying out the survey.
“We have a full fledged department here that carried the survey, and I headed the survey.
“We produced a booklet which was the outcome of our research to show that a good number of people know about this Act, its facts and figures on ground,” he noted.
On complaints by media practionals who face difficulties in accessing information from ministries, agencies, and parastatals, Sabo said it is an offence for any agency or ministry for not giving out informations.
He added that it is an offence that is questionable in court, and that such issues can diriected to the court, even as he said there is a provision in the Act that moderates the level of inquiries particularly national security issues.
On how NOA monitors the level compliance, he said the agency has desk officers in MDAs and organizations and through this partnership it gets feedback through the desk officers who report complaints of no compliance, even as he expressed happiness at the level of compliance from reports.