Enabling Environment for Social Accountability in ... - SASANet

discussion below), the director of the Press Institute suggested that registration be done through a
nongovernmental agency.
ACCESS TO INFORMATION AND THE LEGAL REGIME OF SECRECY
The media’s access to information determines the extent to which they can provide information to the
public. A 2005 study by the Press Institute revealed that media workers identified problems in accessing
information held by public bodies as one of the most serious constraints on their work (Press Institute
2005b). General publication practices in the public sector are improving slowly. 95 A more fundamental
issue, however, is that Mongolia does not have an access to information law, though the need for general
legislation of this sort was identified as a key priority by all stakeholders. In 2005, the coalition
government made a clear commitment to adopt such a law, including it in the Ten Steps to Intensity: The
Implementation of the National Program to Combat Corruption. More recently, a working group set up by
the MoJHA, which includes representatives from CSOs, has been developing a draft of the Access to
Information Law and is currently seeking comments from other ministries.
Given that the Convention on Corruption recently signed by the GoM requires passage of an access to
information law, it is likely that a draft of this law will be considered during the spring 2006
parliamentary session. Failing this, an opposition MP indicated during a dissemination interview that
opposition leaders are willing to put it on the agenda themselves. Nonetheless, Globe International, which
prepared a Draft Law of Mongolia on Freedom of Information in 2002 in collaboration with the INGO
ARTICLE 19, was skeptical since the issue was on the parliamentary agenda in the fall of 2005 as well
and was never addressed (Finding MEDIA 4). 96
While there are a number of specific disclosure provisions in various laws, there is also a draconian State
Secrets Law that establishes broad categories under which information may be classified, and grants
individual bureaucracies the power to develop their own lists of secret documents based on these
categories (Finding MEDIA 5). 97 The government, however, made a commitment in its 2005
anticorruption document to replace this law with a more narrowly drafted one. More recently, a prominent
MP indicated that “there is no talk yet of modifying the state secrecy laws either within the government or
among the MPs.” When the question was put to a representative of the MoJHA, he responded that “this is
not within [their] purview but the responsibility of the State Intelligence Agency.”
The history of secretive government and bureaucratic obstacles dating from socialist rule reinforces the
legal regime of secrecy. As one journalist put it: “We have to sneak around almost like thieves to get
information.” Obstacles include rules specifying that information may be obtained from only one central
contact point; officials causing delays in providing information; and fear among lower officials of the
consequences of disclosing information. Consequently, the president of Globe International indicated that
reform of the state secrecy laws and introduction of a freedom of information law, although critical,
would only be a first step toward changing the culture of secrecy in Mongolia.
95 In the legal area, for example, many laws are still not available online, and it is difficult for nonlawyers to access them in hard
copy. Moreover, only a small number of leading court decisions is published. On the other hand, court archives are generally well
maintained and accessible, albeit for a fee. Mongolia’s extremely ambitious plans for new technology, and particularly e-
government, may help address this problem.
96 The director of Globe International also indicated that they have not yet analyzed the new draft, which would require them to
obtain additional outside funding.
97 For example, Article 36 of the Law on State and Local Property requires publication of information prior to a process of
privatization: all laws of the State Great Khural, orders of the President, and ministerial resolutions must be published (ARTICLE
19 and Globe International 2002:103).
95