Access to information Law

Prepared and presented by:

Khair AlDin bn Soltan

Law and legislative consultant for the ex-

tunisian government

Government Presidency

I- The principles to access information

1. Everyone has the right to access information ownedor acquired by governmental institutions (The executive, legislative and judicial powers)

2. Placing requests should be an easy and free process. It could be through email or post or delieveringpersonally or verbally

3. No justification is needed for asking for information or what will be done with this information

4. Employees are obligated to help applicants and specifying the general structure on which will be usedto send information

5. Replying should be within 15 days maximum

6.Information can be hardcopy or softcopy and checking originals is also possible.7 . Checking original documents should also be for free unless a photocopy is made or a copy on a CD or DVD or any other form.8 . All information can accessed except for some special cases however a justification must be provided.9 . Everyone has the right to file a report to the court against management for refusing access to information.10 . Public institutions should voluntarily put information on their structure, tasks, budget and activities.

II- Challenges faced when preparation the law

•The political situation of the country

•The institutional gap

•Difficulty in engaging the civil society:Participatory approach was weak

•The laws of privacy was not presented.

Archiving Law

Statistics Law

Civil service Law

Personal Data Protection Act

Law on the Protection of Literary and ArtisticProperty

Criminal Code

III - Accompanying actions: an action plan - the road map

-Control and review of legal texts based on theconfidentiality of information management: theCivil Service Law, Archive Law, the Personal DataProtection Act, the Statistics Law, the Criminal

Code, the law of literary and artistic property

-Media campaigns directed to agents and thepublic

-Agents is very important component

-Issuing explanatory leaflets that explain andsimplifies the purposes of various provisions of

the law to get the information directed to staff

-Issuing evidence under the control ofadministration to confirm their right to access

to information and how it's done

-The experience of the Ministry of Finance

Thank you for listening