Protecting the people’s right to information is a fundamental responsibility of any democratic government. (SLWJA) strongly urges the government not to infringe on this fundamental right of the people, as enshrined in the Constitution of the Democratic Socialist Republic of Sri Lanka.
At an official meeting held on 13th May 2026 between representatives of our association and the Deputy Minister of Mass Media, Ms. Kaushalya Ariyaratne, the Deputy Minister officially revealed that the government is taking steps to amend the Right to Information Act No. 12 of 2016 (RTI Act).
With this statement, our association has observed that the current government is preparing to gradually paralyze and destabilize the Right to Information Commission (RTI Commission) through amendments to the Right to Information Act.
Journalists, as well as the general public, have pointed out many serious failures and problems faced by the Information Commission to date. Some of the main problems observed by our association are as follows:
- Shortage of staff and employees: The Commission does not have enough experts to prepare legal documents, and the staff of the entire institution has been reduced to a limited level.
- Lack of members of the Commission: Due to the limited number of times the required 05 members of the Commission are present, the decisions that should be made on behalf of the people are being postponed indefinitely.
- Disobedience of public authorities: The fear and respect shown by government institutions (public authorities) towards the Information Commission is gradually disappearing. As a result, the support given to the Public Institutions Commission may be completely lost in the future.
- Wrong precedent of the Presidential Secretariat: Not providing information to the information requests requested from the Presidential Secretariat. Having to go to court to obtain that information. Accordingly, deliberately failing to provide information is a bad precedent.
Have the general public and journalists’ requests for information from government institutions become a big problem for the current government? Is the government preparing to amend this historic Act with the aim of preventing the public from providing information? We have serious doubts.
It is the responsibility of all Sri Lankan citizens to protect the Right to Information Commission and the Act. Therefore, any attempt to curtail the people’s right to information under the guise of amending the Acts based on narrow political interests, instead of immediately providing the necessary resources and members to the Information Commission, a statutory body, and strengthening it, we emphasize to the government that our association, led by civil society and all media organizations, will launch a strong protest campaign against
Ranga Bandaranaike – President
Mithun Jayawardena – Secretary
2026-05-19 Press Release issued by SLWJA