Only 1% of federal public institutions have budgets for FOI – MRA

The Media Rights Agenda (MRA) has accused the federal government of undermining the effectiveness of the Freedom of Information (FOI) Act by persistently under-funding its implementation.

The MRA said only one percent of federal public institutions have allocations in their 2025 budget proposals for FOI implementation and related activities.

In a statement announcing the release of its 22-page report titled, ‘A Vote Against Transparency: A Report on Allocations for Freedom of Information Implementation in 2025 Federal Budget,’ MRA observed that only 13 out of over 1,300 federal public institutions have provisions for FOI implementation in their budgets, with a proposed total allocation of N230. 825 million, representing 0.000464 percent of the federal government’s budget of N49.74 trillion.

John Gbadamosi, MRA’s programme officer, said: “There is a temptation to argue that it is far more important for the Government to spend resources on tangible projects such as infrastructure and other capital projects than on implementing the FOI Act.”

However, as noted in MRA’s 2024 report on this subject, without adequate investment in the implementation of the FOI Act to ensure that the government is transparent and accountable, all other allocations and expenditures for infrastructure, facilities or other development projects would be at risk and could easily be misappropriated.

He insisted that “the long-term benefits which the effective implementation of the FOI Act can bring to the country and its democratic process, including enhancing government transparency, efficiency and responsiveness; engendering greater public participation in governance, improving public trust and confidence in government, ensuring that members of the public have accurate and reliable information about how they are governed, contributing to the emergence of a knowledge society, among others, make it imperative that far more significant resources necessary to make the Act effective are allocated.”

Gbadamosi identified the public institutions which have allocations for FOI implementation and related activities as the Federal Government Staff Housing Loans Board, Bureau of Public Service Reforms, Small and Medium Enterprises Development Agency of Nigeria, Federal Ministry of Labour and Employment, Federal Ministry of Works, and Federal Ministry of Budget and Economic Planning.

The others are: Federal Ministry of Housing and Urban Development, Federal Ministry of Environment, National Library of Nigeria, National Commission for College Education Secretariat, Federal Ministry of Steel Development, Office of the Surveyor General of the Federation, and the Nigerian Law Reform Commission.

Gbadamosi noted that the level of funding in the federal government’s 2025 budget proposals for FOI implementation and FOI-related activities by public institutions recorded a significant increase of 96.76 percent over the level for 2024 in terms of the amount allocated.

He argued that without adequate resources to support the full implementation of this critical piece of legislation, the FOI Act will become a symbolic but ineffectual gesture rather than a functional tool for transparency.

“It is quite disheartening that nearly 14 years after the FOI Act became Law, the Federal Government has for the most part failed to provide the necessary financial, technical and human resources as well as infrastructure and political will to ensure its full and effective implementation, thereby displaying a clear lack of commitment to transparency, accountability, and good governance,” he said