FOI would have helped Penan

ARCHIVES 2009

By admin-s On Sep 15, 2009

(The Nut Graph) THE haphazard release of the Penan Task Force report last week is symptomatic of a glaring lack of access, as a rule, to publicly funded government information.

The report, which confirmed the rape and sexual abuse of Penan women and girls, was publicly unavailable for months despite repeated calls by advocacy groups for it to be released. After a string of unanswered calls and letters, Parti Keadilan Rakyat (PKR) Wanita chief Zuraida Kamaruddin was surprisingly informed when she visited the Women, Family and Community Development Ministry on 8 Sept 2009 that the report could be collected.

Shahrizat (Pic courtesy of theSun) Minister Datuk Seri Shahrizat Abdul Jalil told the press on 10 Sept during a buka puasa event in Kuala Lumpur that the report had actually been approved by the cabinet in May 2009, making it a public document since. "Anyone who wants to have a look can come… [but] because there was a special request, that's why we put it on the website," she said.

But the minister's comments contradict her earlier remarks on the matter and her ministry's actions in May when they refused to comment on when the report would be made public.

"The report was with us all the while, but it was on the website later on," said Women's Development Department Director-General Datuk Dr Noorul Ainur Mohd Nur at the same buka puasa event.

When reminded that The Nut Graph was unable to obtain the report during an investigative visit to her office on 21 Aug, Noorul conceded that it was put on the website only thereafter. However, the ministry made no attempt to alert the public or the media about the report's availability. It was only because PKR's Zuraida released the report to others that the media got a copy of it.

Additionally, regardless of whether or not the report was considered public after May 2009, no member of the public has been able to get hold of a copy until 8 Sept. This leaves a trail of unanswered questions.

Why should cabinet have to approve the release of a government-commissioned task force report?

Considering the seriousness of the crimes, shouldn't the ministry have made this report public much earlier, instead of nearly a year after reports surfaced that the Penan were being violated?

Why didn't the ministry call a press conference to discuss the report's findings at the very start, instead of only pledging to release it to "interested parties" who visited the ministry?