PRESS RELEASE - FREETOWN, APRIL 19, 2023. The Right to Access Information Commission RA IC has on Tuesday 18th April, 2023, launched its 2021 Annual Report.
At a press briefing held at the conference hall of the Ministry of Agriculture of Forestry in Freetown, the Commission launched its third Annual Report since its establishment in October, 2014.
In his keynote address before officially launching the 2021 RAIC Report, the Chairman and Information Commissioner Dr. Ibrahim Seaga Shaw said the report saw a significant increase in the number of requests when compared to the past two years, this the chairman attributed to the robust and sustained advocacy and consultation the Commission has had with Public Authorities. He underscored the significance of the Annual Compliance Report to the UNESCO survey which takes a tally of compliance to information requests among countries to which Sierra Leone has been scoring high marks. Dr Shaw said now that that the RAI regulations are in place, he believes that more MDAs will have a clear roadmap on their obligations on how to respond to requests and the keeping of proper records for onward submission to the RAIC. He paid tribute to Statistics Sierra Leone (Stats-SL) for being one of the Model MDAs for being the few MDAs that scored 100% pass mark in their Proactive Disclosure of Information (PDI) with an impeccable record of consistently meeting all the required PDI classes of information and a well detailed ACR. He called on other MDAs to emulate the good example of Stats-SL.
Giving an overview of the Annual Report earlier, The Executive Secretary (ES) of the RAIC Hon. Mustapha Braima said the 2021 Annual Report is compartmentalised into five parts ranging from the composition of the Commission, its activities and achievement, financial statements amongst others. The ES added that the production and presentation of the annual report is a statutory obligation enshrined in section 41of the RAI Act of 2013 which mandates the Commission to produce an Annual report on its activities, financial status and compliance rate of all public Authorities on Proactive Disclosure of Information (PDI) and the Annual Compliance Report (ACR).
Head of compliance team, RAIC Alan Benjamin Esq said the 2021 annual report saw an improvement in the responses and completion of the templates as well as the timeline in the submission of to RAIC. and believe the future will even get better. The interactive briefing ended as questions and comments from the press and other participants who thanked the RAIC for being consistent in the production of its annual reports of engagement activities.
The 2021 Annual Report is the third report produced by the RAIC under the leadership of Dr Ibrahim Seaga Shaw since taking over in October 2018.
For media inquiries, contact:
David Patrick Kamara / Public Information Officer
Right to Access Information Commission (RAIC) National Secretariat
+23278407847 / Email:
