THE Ministry of Information and Broadcasting Services being ranked the most secretive public institution confirms the need for the enactment of the Freedom of Information (FoI) Bill, Press Association of Zambia (PAZA), vice-president Amos Chanda has said.

Chanda was commenting on a Media Institute of Southern Africa (MISA) report findings that Zambian public institutions operate in secrecy with nearly 100 per cent failure to respond to citizens’ requests for information with the information ministry emerging as the most secretive public institution.

Chanda told Post Online that the findings should serve as a wake up call to public institutions to live up to the standards of making information available.

He said it was particularly embarrassing that the Ministry of Information and Broadcasting Services should be ranked the most secretive public institution when it was mandated to give out information on what government was doing.

“As a wing of government tasked to make information available, it’s very embarrassing that those were the findings about them.

That’s the call we have always been making, regarding the need for the enactment of the freedom of the information bill, this does confirm the need for such a law so that citizens are made aware of what government is doing,” he said.

He said the MISA report was an expose that the ministry was not performing the functions for which it was established.

“Given the rankings that they have, you will not think that they are serving the functions for which they are supposed to. That’s why I said this should be a wake up call, “he said.

Chanda urged public institutions to respond to the challenges that require them to give information to the public when information was needed and also be proactive by giving the information before the public even demanded for it.

On Tuesday, MISA released a report following its research conducted on five public institutions on secrecy namely the Electoral Commission of Zambia (ECZ), Ministry of Finance and National Planning, Ministry of Education, Ministry of Information and Broadcasting Services and the Ministry of Communication and Transport.

The report ranked the information ministry the most secretive while the ECZ was ranked the most open to the public.

But information and broadcasting minister Ronnie Shikapwasha has since dismissed the report describing it as inaccurate and biased.