President’s Office chief spokesperson Mohamed Hussain Shareef (Mundhu), has said there is some truth to government claims that the Right to Information Act is being misused, despite the Information Commissioner saying there is no evidence of abuse.
Speaking during his weekly Thursday press briefing, Mundhu said he made the remarks after carefully reviewing the issue.
He said he respected the views of Information Commissioner Ahmed Ahid Rasheed, but disagreed with his assessment.
“I respect what the commissioner said. That is his opinion,” Mundhu said.
According to Mundhu, some individuals submit RTI requests to agencies unrelated to the information sought, while others repeatedly file identical requests through different identities.
“The same story repeated 50 times under different identities, the same question on the same day in the names of different people, we all know that is not a coincidence,” he said.
Mundhu also shared statistics on RTI requests received by the President’s Office between May last year and 1 May this year.
According to the figures:
- 288 RTI requests were submitted
- 233 requests were answered
- 55 requests remain pending
He said some unanswered requests involve information that is still being collected, while others concern sensitive matters that cannot be disclosed immediately.
“There are requests concerning Maldives’ foreign relations, confidentiality clauses in financial agreements and matters relating to national security,” he said.
“Some things cannot be answered.”
Mundhu noted that the RTI Act itself had been introduced under a previous administration led by the same political camp now in government.
He said the government remained committed to responding to requests submitted with “the right intentions” and through proper procedures.
Attorney General Ahmed Usham on Wednesday also alleged that the RTI Act was being abused, saying large volumes of requests were placing pressure on state institutions.
In response, Information Commissioner Ahid said there was no evidence of systematic misuse of the law, and argued that the more common issue was the failure of government agencies to fulfil their obligations to disclose information.
