Parliament has passed the law spelling out the various fees to be paid by persons seeking Information under the Right to Information law.
This is the Fees and Charges (Miscellaneous provisions Act 2022 (ACT 1080). Persons seeking Information are to pay 0.27 pesewas for every photocopy of A4 size of information.
Section 75 of the Right to Information Act, 2019, (ACT 989) requires applicants to pay the fee approved by Parliament.
“An applicant seeking access to information under this Act shall pay the fee or charge approved by Parliament in accordance with the Fees and Charges (Miscellaneous Provisions) Act,2009 (Act 793).”
The Right to Information Commission in accordance with this law submitted a proposal to Parliament spelling out how much should be charged.
Even before this could be passed, applicants seeking information were in some instances asked to pay amounts considered to be problematic.
The Fourth Estate’s Evans Aziamor Mensah was asked by the Minerals Commission to pay $1,000 to access Information.
This amount was later set aside by the Right to Information Commission as being unreasonable. The matter is currently pending at the Court of Appeal.
Speaking on The Law on the Joynews Channel, Executive Secretary of the RTI Commission Yaw Sarpong Boateng said the new fees approved by Parliament will provide clarity on the matter.
“It sits with our argument that the fees ought to be reasonable in respect of the reproduction not for the cost of generating the Information.”