The Attorney General's Office has appealed at High Court the Information Commissioner's Office order to disclose information on the 248 political appointees that the government claims were dismissed.
The Attorney General's Office has appealed at High Court the Information Commissioner's Office order to disclose information on the 248 political appointees that the government claims were dismissed.
On October 15 last year, President Dr Mohamed Muizzu announced that 228 political appointees will be dismissed from various state institutions under the Economic Reform Agenda. President's Office Spokesperson Heena Waleed later announced that at the end of the period allocated for this, 248 political appointees had been dismissed.
However, the government has so far not revealed the details of those who were dismissed, including which ministries the dismissals had been from.
Under the Right to Information Act, Mihaaru News and some others sought these details. The Information Commissioner's Office has ordered the President's Office to disclose this information.
However, the High Court's website shows that the Attorney General's Office has appealed this iCOM ruling at the court last Sunday. The court has so far not made a decision on accepting the case.
The President's Office's initial response to the RTI request stated that the names of the political appointees are personal information under Article 24 of the Constitution as per a previous Supreme Court ruling. Hence, this information cannot be disclosed, they said.
They said that revealing the names of the ministries and designations of the dismissed political appointees may compromise their personal information. They said that as the law states that the personal information of a third party cannot be revealed without their consent, this information, too, could not be released.
While the President's Office cites these reasons, some ministries have previously shared full information regarding political appointees under RTI requests.
In the initial announcement, the President said that 7 State Ministers, 43 Deputy Ministers, 109 Senior Political Directors and 69 Political Directors will be amongst those to be dismissed. He said then that dismissal of this number of political appointees would save the State upwards of MVR 5.7 million per month.
Previous information shared by various ministries under RTI requests from Mihaaru indicate that there are over 1400 political appointees in this administration.
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