What is meant by “governance theatre” is the common Sri Lankan practice of enacting Constitutional and legislative measures that provide a feeling of improved governance with little or no effect.
Right to Information
After decades of effort, the right to access information, (RTI) was added to the Constitution in 2015 as Article 14A. The RTI Commission was established by Act No. 12 of 2016. It’s not without its flaws, which were pointed out through numerous articles published while the drafting committee was doing its work, but it was progress.
The RTI legislation has broad applicability, governing the information retention and disclosure practices not only of all Government departments, statutory bodies and companies where the Government holds a majority, but also private entities that receive Government and foreign funds. With broad applicability across the economy comes the requirement of a competent and well-resourced RTI Commission. The right to information cannot be assured without a regulator with teeth. Without such a regulator, information will not be disclosed and the culture of openness in government established. It is an essential government function that cannot be outsourced.
Though it has the authority to compel the disclosure of information by any Ministry and the right to access information is in the Constitution, the RTI Commission is not positioned as a supra-ministerial body like the National Audit Office. Instead, it has been positioned as an entity under the Ministry responsible for Mass Media, creating an instant conflict of interest. The parent Ministry which has to formulate the Commission’s budget requests has no interest in a fully resourced and empowered RTI Commission. Neither does the Ministry of Finance which approves its budget requests.
Therefore, it is no surprise that the RTI Commission is starved of funds, cannot attract or hold good professionals, and many are frustrated by its performance. It is given the same amount for salaries as the redundant Sri Lanka Press Council, which is under the same ministry, and only 11 million rupees more in total. A corporation that should be self-financing, the National Film Corporation, is given three times the funds of the RTI Commission.
The RTI Commission requires competent staff, including lawyers who do not come cheap, especially after the pay increases won by the Attorney General’s Department in 2015-19. The puny allocation for compensating the RTI Commission’s staff translates into inability to fill the cadre and to recruit and retain competent professionals. The comparator entities do not require professional staff of the level the RTI Commission does but are provided the same or more. Strangely, the Sri Lanka Press Council has a cadre of 10 while the RTI Commission has 19. If the cadre is filled, the average per employee would be less in the RTI Commission than in the Press Council.
Beware of theatre
There is little debate about the need for better governance if Sri Lanka is to become a good place to live. The 2022 economic crisis and its continuing effects may be seen as a crisis of governance. But real improvements in governance must be distinguished from theatre. Otherwise, we will exacerbate the crisis, not remove the root causes.
Organisations such as the Center for Law and Democracy that position Sri Lanka among the top-ranked in RTI have been taken in by the theatrical illusion and through their uncritical focus on black-letter law and neglect of what actually happens on the ground reinforce the illusion. But then, it is a mystery why anyone would take seriously a ranking that places Afghanistan as the world’s number one.
The best law is not one that is optimal in a technical sense, but one which is most appropriate for the local conditions. Otherwise it is governance theatre. Illusion may create warm feelings but does not change the world.
(Excerpts from a longer article entitled
Governance Theaere by Rohan Samajeewa in Daily FT )
