If there is one arm of government that I am passionate about it is the legislature. The simple reason is that they make laws that govern society. But the pertinent questions are: HOW TRANSPARENT IS OUR LEGISLATURE? DO THEY CONSIDER CITIZENS PARTICIPATION IN THE LAWS THAT THEY MAKE FOR THE COUNTRY AND STATES? WHAT IS THE RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN THE LEGISLATURE, MEDIA, CIVIL SOCIETY ORGANIZATIONS AND THE GENERAL PUBLIC? WHERE ARE OUR LAWS DOMICILED IN ELECTRONIC FORMATS?
If there is no existing cordial relationship among the listed stakeholders in the business of legislation, then there is room for suspicion and that is more reason you have platforms like "LETS OCCUPY THE NATIONAL ASSEMBLY."
BELOW ARE EXPECTED FROM THE LEGISLATURE TO BUILD CONFIDENCE WITH THE PEOPLE.
Parliament shall adopt policies that ensure proactive publication of parliamentary information, and shall review these policies periodically to take advantage of evolving good practices. Parliamentary information includes information about parliament’s roles and functions, and information generated throughout the legislative process, including the text of introduced legislation and amendments, votes, the parliamentary agenda and schedule, records of plenary and committee proceedings, historical information, and all other information that forms a part of the parliamentary record, such as reports created for or by parliament. Parliament shall provide information on the management and administration of parliament, parliamentary staff, and comprehensive and detailed parliamentary budget information. Parliament shall provide information about the backgrounds, activities and affairs of members, including sufficient information for citizens to make informed judgments regarding their integrity and probity, and potential conflicts of interest.
Easing Access to Parliamentary Information: Parliament shall ensure that information is broadly accessible to all citizens on a non-discriminatory basis through multiple channels, including first-person observation, print media, radio, and live and on-demand broadcasts and streaming. Physical access to parliament shall be provided to all citizens, subject to space and safety limitations, with clearly defined and publicly available policies for ensuring access by media and observers. Parliamentary information must also be available free of charge, in multiple national and working languages, and through tools, such as plain language summaries, that help ensure that parliamentary information is understandable to a broad range of citizens.
Promoting a Culture of openness
1. Recognizing Public Ownership of Parliamentary Information
Parliamentary information belongs to the public; citizens should be allowed to reuse and republish parliamentary information, in whole or in part. Any exceptions or restrictions to this principle shall be narrowly defined by law.
2. Advancing a Culture of Openness through Legislation
Parliament has a duty to enact legislation, as well as internal rules of procedure and codes of conduct, that foster an enabling environment guaranteeing the public’s right to government and parliamentary information, promoting a culture of open government, providing for transparency of political finance, safeguards freedoms of expression and assembly, and ensuring engagement by civil society and citizens in the legislative process
3. Protecting a Culture of Openness through Oversight
In fulfilling its oversight function, parliament shall guarantee that laws ensuring government openness are implemented effectively, that the government acts in a fully transparent manner, and that government also works to promote a culture of openness.
4. Promoting Civic Education
Parliament has a responsibility to actively promote civic education of the public, particularly youth, by promoting understanding of parliament’s rules and procedures, parliament’s work, and the role of parliament and its members.
5. Engaging Citizens and Civil Society
Parliament has a duty to actively engage citizens and civil society, without discrimination, in parliamentary processes and decision-making in order to effectively represent citizen interests and to give effect to the right of citizens to petition their government.
6. Protecting an Independent Civil Society
Parliament has a duty to support measures to ensure that civil society organizations are able to operate freely and without restriction.
7. Enabling Effective Parliamentary Monitoring
Parliament shall recognize the right and duty of civil society, media, and the general public to monitor parliament and parliamentarians. Parliament shall engage in consultations with the general public and civil society organizations that monitor parliament to encourage effective monitoring and reduce barriers in accessing parliamentary information.
8. Sharing Good Practice
Parliament shall actively participate in international and regional exchanges of good practice with other parliaments and with civil society organizations to increase the openness and transparency of parliamentary information, improve the use of information and communication technologies, and strengthen adherence to democratic principles.
9. Ensuring Legal Recourse
Parliament shall enact legislation to ensure that citizens have effective access to legal or judicial recourse in instances where citizens’ access to government or parliamentary information is in dispute.
10. Disseminating Complete Information
Parliamentary information available to the public shall be as complete as possible, reflecting the entirety of parliamentary action, subject only to narrowly and precisely defined exceptions.
11. Providing Timely Information
Parliamentary information shall be provided to the public in a timely manner. As a general rule, information shall be provided in real time. To the extent that doing so is impossible, parliamentary information shall be released publicly as quickly as it is available internally.
12. Ensuring Accurate Information
Parliament shall ensure a process to retain authoritative records and guarantee that the information it releases to the public is accurate.
Making parliamentary Information transparent
13. Adopting Policies on Parliamentary Transparency
Parliament shall adopt policies that ensure the proactive dissemination of parliamentary information, including policies regarding the formats in which this information will be published. Parliamentary transparency policies shall be publicly available and shall specify terms for their periodic review to take advantage of technological innovations and evolving good practices. Where parliament may not have the immediate capacity to publish comprehensive parliamentary information, parliament should develop partnerships with civil society to ensure broad public access to parliamentary information.
14. Providing Information on Parliament’s Roles and Functions
Parliament shall make available information about its constitutional role, structure, functions, internal rules, administrative procedures and workflow, as well as the same information for its committees.
15. Providing Information on Members of Parliament
Parliament shall provide sufficient and regularly updated information for citizens to understand a member’s credentials, party affiliation, electoral mandate, roles in parliament, attendance, identities of personal staff, and any other information members wish to divulge about themselves and their credentials. Working contact information for the parliamentary and constituency offices of members shall also be available to the public.
16. Providing Information on Parliamentary Staff and Administration
Parliament shall make available information about its administrative functioning and the structure of parliamentary staff that manage and administer parliamentary processes. Contact information for staff responsible for providing information to the public should be publicly available.
17. Informing Citizens regarding the Parliamentary Agenda
Documentation relating to the scheduling of parliamentary business shall be provided to the public, including the session calendar, information regarding scheduled votes, the order of business and the schedule of committee hearings. Except in rare instances involving urgent legislation, parliament shall provide sufficient advance notice to allow the public and civil society to provide input to members regarding items under consideration.
18. Engaging Citizens on Draft Legislation
Draft legislation shall be made public and published upon its introduction. Recognizing the need for citizens to be fully informed about and provide input into items under consideration, parliament shall seek to provide public access to preparatory analysis and background information to encourage broad understanding of policy discussions about the proposed legislation.
19. Publishing Records of Committee Proceedings
Reports of committee proceedings, including documents created and received, testimony of witnesses at public hearings, transcripts, and records of committee actions, shall promptly be made public.
20. Recording Parliamentary Votes
To ensure members’ accountability to their constituents for their voting behavior, parliament shall minimize the use of voice voting in plenary and shall use roll call or electronic voting in most cases, maintaining and making available to the public a record of the voting behavior of individual members in plenary and in committees. Similarly, parliament shall minimize the use of proxy voting and ensure that it does not undermine norms of transparency and democratic accountability.
21. Publishing Reports Created by or Provided to Parliament
All reports created by parliament or that are requested or required to be submitted to parliament, its offices, or committees, shall be made public in their entirety, except in narrowly defined circumstances identified by law.
22. Providing Information on the Budget and Expenditures
Parliament has a responsibility to make public comprehensive, detailed, and easily understandable information about the national budget and public expenditures, including past, current, and projected revenues and expenditures. Similarly, parliament has a duty to publish information regarding the parliament’s own budget, including information about its own budget execution and bids and contracts. This information shall be made public in its entirety, using a consistent taxonomy, along with plain language summaries, explanations or reports that help promote citizen understanding.
23. Disclosing Assets and Ensuring the Integrity of Members
Parliament shall make available sufficient information to allow citizens to make informed judgments regarding the integrity and probity of individual members, including information on members’ asset disclosures, their parliamentary expenses, and their non-parliamentary income, including interest, dividends, lease payments or other in-kind benefits.
WITH THIS, THE INTEGRITY, OPENESS AND TRANSPARENCY IN LEGISLATIVE BUSINESS WILL NOT BE IN QUESTION. THE LEGISLATIVE ARM OF GOVERNMENT IS VERY IMPORTANT IN ANY DEMOCRACY AND THE PEOPLE MUST HOLD THEM IN HIGH ESTEEM. THE PARLIAMENT BELONG TO THE PEOPLE AND THE PARLIAMENT MUST BE ACCESSIBLE TO THE PEOPLE THEY REPRESENT. LET'S SEE NIGERIA PARLIAMENT AS THE PEOPLE'S PARLIAMENT NOT ONLY IN WORDS BUT IN DEEDS. #OpenParliament #ThePeopleParliament #TransparentParliament
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