Activity Details (ID# 7516)

Activity Synopsis

The objective of the seminar was to present the European standards concerning Access to information and to discuss with the participants the Albanian legislation in this field and the possible difficulties regarding its implementation.  

The seminar was very well organised. All participants received an Albanian translation of Recommendation (2002)2 on access to official documents and its Explanatory Memorandum as well as the Albanian law on access to official documents commented by the Albanian Institute for Policy and Legal Studies.

During the first session, Mr. Schram presented the European standards regarding access to official documents. The second session was dedicated to Albanian legislation and practice concerning access to information. Mr. Gent Ibrahimi, Executive Director of the Institute for Policy & Legal Studies, explained that, in general, the Albanian law guaranteed efficient access to information. However, he stressed that one sensitive issue remained the deadline for transmission of requested documents: indeed, according to the law the administration has a 40 day time limit to reply to citizen who asked for information. The justification given for such a time limit is the “lack of administrative capacities”. The question was asked whether this provision should be amended. It was also mentioned that the law was not explicit on the possibility to obtain a copy of a document on an oral request. Practical problems met in the implementation of the law were also discussed (see next paragraph).

During the second session the Belgian system of access to official documents was set out by Mr Schram and Ms Dimitrova shared her experience, as a journalist, to obtain as much information as she could on the basis of the Bulgarian Law and also on the basis of the Freedom of Information Act in the US. In his presentation, Mr Remzi Lani, Executive Director of the Albanian Media Institute, insisted on the fact that the law was not recognised by public officials and not known or not understood by Journalists and the public. Among the concrete difficulties of implementation were also mentioned the difficulties of physically accessing the institutions and the lack of organisation and internal procedure in public institutions to reply to information requests. During the discussion, questions were raised on how to deal with classified information.

Finally, at the end of the seminar, some participants expressed their worry about the fact that, outside big towns, there was no access to information in the meaning of access to the media for every one. They stressed that there were almost no newspapers and no TV and stated that the problems of infrastructure and poverty could not justify such a desertion.
 

Public officials in Tirana and in the regions should benefit from training in order to have the same understanding of the law and to implement the Law better. Citizens should be informed and educated too.

Lastly, more important attention should be given to people living outside big towns where the right to access to information, in its wider meaning, does not seems to be respected at all.

 

Journalists and civil servants 

Mr. Frankie Schram, legal adviser of the Commission on access to official documents, Belgium;
Ms Alexinia Dimitrova, Journalist, Bulgaria
 

Ms Charlotte de Broutelles, Media Division, Directorate General of Human Rights