ROUNDTABLES WITH MUNICIPALITIES AND CSOS

October 13-14, 2017, FSVC and ATCP organized two roundtables in Tabarka with the participation of Northwestern municipalities and Civil Society Organizations (CSOs) to present their joint MEPI-funded program “Onshor”.

On October 13-14, 2017,   Onshor’s team members met with Northwestern municipalities and Civil Society Organizations (CSOs) in Tabarka to establish meaningful partnerships and discuss what are the constraints preventing municipalities to disclose their information to the public.

During the roundtable, representatives from participating municipalities showed interest to comply with the Right-to-Information (RTI) law.  These municipalities, however, face several issues in implementing the law. The most cited obstacles faced includes, among others, lack of technical support, lack of understanding of the legal dimension of the RTI law and lack of understanding of records management. As result, they requested Onshor’s assistance to help disclose public information.

The second roundtable discussed how local CSOs can help municipalities comply with the RTI law and disclose information in Open Data formats (i.e, formats that can be used, reused and free of rights). In particular, they shared their expectation about the various datasets that should be disclosed by municipalities on proactive basis. This will help create local value-added services based on Open Data. During the roundtable, participants also discussed the efforts deployed by CSOs to address social issues in their regions, and increase transparency of governmental institutions by submitting RTI requests. At the end of the roundtable,  participating CSOs showed a genuine interest to help municipalities on how to comply with the RTI law.

What information do you think should be disclosed by municipalities on proactive basis and why? Let us know on social media and/or email us at contact@onshor.org

حلقات نقاش مع البلديات و ممثلي المجتمع المدني