ISLAMABAD: After hea­ring a case regarding violation of the Right of Access to Information Act 2017, the Pakistan Infor­mation Com­m­i­ssion (PIC) has directed the President Office to provide data regarding its employees and vacancies to a citizen within 10 days.

The President Office can approach the high court against the decision within 30 days, otherwise the PIC would start contempt proceedings against the principal secretary of the president.

According to the decision of the PIC, announced by Chief Information Commi­ssioner Mohammad Azam and information commissioners Fawad Malik and Zahid Abdullah, a citizen, Mukhtar Ahmed Ali, approached the PIC on May 6, 2019 stating that he had submitted an information request to the principal secretary under the Right of Access to Information Act 2017.

The request was made to provide detail of the total sanctioned strength of staff members of President Office against different positions, total vacancies in the President Office against different pay-scales/positions, number of staff members who are not regular but have been engaged on daily-wage basis or through short-term or long-term contracts against various positions/ pay-scales, number and types of positions created anew since Jan 1, 2017, total number of female staff members, total number of persons with disabilities working with the President Office, total number of transgender persons working and a certified copy of the latest approved Service Rules of the President Office.

However, on Nov 11, the President Office said: “The Right of Access to Information Act, 2017 applied to public bodies of the Federal Government as envisaged in section 1(2) of the Act whereas, the office of the President does not fall within the ambit of the said act. Law and Justice Division has endorsed the views.”

Information Commi­ssioner Zahid Abdullah, while talking to Dawn, said that the PIC was of the view that office of the president was a public body as all the bodies that do public functions were considered public bodies.

“Moreover, the office of the president is run with public money. If, for the sake of argument, it was accepted that the [President Office] was not a public body and the President Office was allowed not to share information, the Right of Access to Information Act 2017 clearly says all the contradictory laws will be declared null and void and people have a right to get information,” he said.

The verdict stated that in the constitutional petition 39 of 2019, Juris Foundation through Chairman vs Federal Government through Secretary, Ministry of Defence, the Supreme Court said: “Acts of the Parliament or subordinate legislation are public documents and must be readily available to the citizens of the country subject to the exceptions provided under the Right of Access to Information Act, 2017. Those exceptions extend only to record relating to defence forces, defence installations or connected therewith and ancillary to defence and national security, and not to the Army Laws.”

The President dealt with matters which effected and had repercussions on the public at large and the purposes for which the office of the president was established as such that in which the people of Pakistan had a general interest, the verdict stated.

Published in Dawn, March 12th, 2020