Dear PS Ndemo and All.

I have been following the debate on Freedom of Information and the emerging issues raised by many of you. I certainly agree with the PS that we need a cultural shift to make our people appreciate the value of information and use. But it is also my view that in order to use information and we need to manage it and especially we need to manage records and have proper structures in all of our institutions to promote sound records management.

We need to think about what will happen when eventually we are able to get the FOI law enacted, will there be well managed information and more specifically records to access and to access them in a timely manner. Will it be possible to meet the timelines that may be set by the Act to provide the required information? do we even have the requisite infrastructure to ensure that this happens? and are we working hard to provide that enabling environment?

Having a law in place is one thing and we certainly need an FOI law to create a demand for information and to bolster the gains brought about by our new constitution, but changing the mindset even among those of us who have an understanding of the critical issues of information and records management and beginning to lend support to initiatives to manage records properly remains a herculian task.

If we are not careful, our societies may remain without memory as we embrace the digital environment. A recent IDRC study on aligning records management with e-Govt, ICTs and FOI across all five East African Community countries revealed that there were serious gaps with regard to policy, capacity building, infrastructure and much more.

My appeal is that as we deliberate on issues of FOI let's all begin to think seriously and critical about how we can incorporate records management into discussions about ICT development, e-Government and development generally.

It will not help our cause if we keep relegating the management of records to a clerical activity while at the same time we need quality information for decision making, etc. The resolutions of a stakeholders meeting held in Arusha to deliberate on the findings of the IDRC research acknowledged the huge gaps that exist and called for action to be taken by all five of the EAC countries.

Justus Wamukoya

From: "bitange@jambo.co.ke" <bitange@jambo.co.ke>
To: jwamukoya1@yahoo.com
Cc: kictanet@lists.kictanet.or.ke
Sent: Wednesday, 19 October 2011, 22:11
Subject: Re: [kictanet] Freedom of Information laws and records management/More questions raised by Dr Ndemo and Harry Delano

Grace,
Knowledge evolves when people understand new concepts and belief in them.
Our situation is where we belief in unverified (non scientific)
information. It is an ingrained cultural practice that must change.
Since we must implement section 35 (access to information) of our
constitution, our focus now is how can we make our people embrace the
process of decision making.

The government has made real progress in driving policy based on research.
Sometime last year we expressed concern over increasing girl child
dropout rate. Finance Minister wanted to know the causes. He was
informed that it was due to lack of sanitary towels that forced the young
minds to miss out on their education. You can clearly see this on the
census data. In his budget this year the Minister put a side some 300
million shillings for sanitary towels. This is how we can begin to
explain the need for information and how we can impact on policy.
Unfortunately, we now define information narrowly as something the
government has hidden.

Media for example looks at information only when there is a scoop. Let us
be more optimistic and focus on Harry's proposal of information value
chain.

Ndemo

>
> Bwana PS and Harry
>
> Thanks for those well articulated positions. Just to capture some issues
> you have raised:
>
> · That FoI has not built demand for information into the kind of
> model under discussion on the list.
> · There is need for a complete cultural re-orientation to make
> Kenyans use information. As it is, Kenyans are not utilizing a lot of
> information available.
> · Kenyans need to move from an oral culture, and start documenting
> information, and make it available (I am actually curious of those 15
> Ugali recipes:)).
> · And very important is that data being released by the government
> needs conversion into meaningful and usable information.
> · There is need for ethnic language institutions to facilitate
> better communication.
> · That we need home bred solutions and must confront key
> challenges as well as define what works for us.
> · And that the Platform on Access to Information Declaration needs
> a review in order to capture the digital information age realities.
>
> Some key questions arise from your contributions:
>
> 1. That Data in its stored form can never be information, until the
> same is conveyed to the target audience. What of knowledge? Where on the
> value chain do we build up data into knowledge, so that we can build ours
> into a "knowledge-based economy"?
>
> 2. And if we go up the data/information tree, what about data that has
> yet to find its way into the data bank, possibly some which remains in
> institutional memory form. How do we ensure we capture this for future
> generations?
>
> 3. What formats are we to get the information?
>
> 4. Who will set the standards for information?
>
> 5. How will the poor benefit from the information?
>
> 6. How will the information be disseminated?
>
> Listers, please feel free to respond to any of the questions and lets keep
> this debate going.
>
> Rgds
> Grace
>
>
>
> -----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
> If you have the strength to survive, you have the power to succeed. Life
> is all about choices we make depending upon the situation we are in. Go
> forth and rule the World!
>
>
>
>> Date: Wed, 19 Oct 2011 04:17:22 +0300
>> Subject: Re: [kictanet] Freedom of Information laws and records
>> management/ e- discussion continued
>> From: bitange@jambo.co.ke
>> To: ggithaiga@hotmail.com
>> CC: bitange@jambo.co.ke; kictanet@lists.kictanet.or.ke
>>
>>
>>
>> Grace,
>> I am sort of disappointed with the discussion on FOI. We are delving
>> much
>> into theoretical assumptions. The whole issue of FOI has not built
>> demand
>> for the information into the kind of model we are discussing. Let us not
>> allow foreigners dictate why we need information to be available to our
>> citizens.
>>
>> What needs to be done is more of cultural reorientation to make our
>> people
>> use information. We rarely make informed decisions. I mean use of
>> science to make decisions. Poverty keeps on going up yet science tells
>> us
>> our productivity has dropped to the extent those we call farmers cannot
>> make ends meet. Whereas we need qualified people in work place we do not
>> require qualification for farmers. We now have novice farmers as wen
>> grapple with food insecurity. If we cannot use available information on
>> how we can be food secure, what more information you need that would
>> change our lives?
>>
>> For as long as we have lived on earth no Kenyan community has
>> information
>> on their own recipes. The assumptions is that if you want Ugali you just
>> get to know how to cook it. There are more than fifteen Ugali recipes
>> and
>> none is documented. There are more than 100 Githeri recipes and none is
>> documented to create rich information that application developers can
>> proudly create apps. Until we move from our oral culture, information
>> will be confined to storage places where it will occasionally be used.
>>
>> We are also confusing information and data. The Government can release
>> data and unless someone converts it into information, it will never
>> translate to your theoretical assumptions. We generally want to listen
>> to
>> someone tells us what information is available. You recall some
>> communities did not read the constitution since the leaders had read it.
>> I had difficulty explaining some sections of the constitution even
>> though
>> we all had the document.
>>
>> FOI will pass as has been many legislations that were key. We have
>> fought
>> for these legislations but after they are passed nothing happens. We
>> wanted the ICT policy but many of it's advocates have not gone out there
>> to tell Kenyans how to benefit from it. This certainly will happen the
>> same way to FOI. We are rebels without a cause. I have met dozens of
>> women groups and taken them through our census report highlighting the
>> glaring disparities between men and women but in spite the fact that
>> they
>> promise to do something, none has ever done anything even bringing the
>> issue up for debate.
>>
>> We must aim to change our culture. We must make our people to demand to
>> know what information they require in order to change from where they
>> are
>> to a desired future. We must build institutional frameworks to move date
>> into information. As we debate, let us put a side theories from
>> textbooks
>> and begin from the end. Ask questions such as what formats are we to get
>> the information? Who will set the standards for information? How will
>> the
>> poor benefit from the information? How will the information be
>> disseminated?
>>
>> Picture our problems and create the vision on how information can be
>> used
>> to bring better life for our people. Work the food security issue I
>> mentioned backwards. We have mapped our soils in the country and the
>> result is available on the open data yet you see farmers growing crops
>> that will never give them the desired productivity. For example, in
>> Ukambani, farmers can grow cassava or water Mellon which will give them
>> more money to buy maize from the north rift instead of them growing the
>> maize that would impoverish them. How can we effectively communicate
>> this.
>>
>> We must create language institutes for every ethnic group in Kenya.
>> Language is dynamic yet we have not kept pace with technological
>> advancement with our languages. This is why we fail to communicate.
>> There is no African language that has a translation of break-even point
>> or
>> productivity yet these two words determine whether you will be poor or
>> not. Information is information if the medium of communication is
>> understood by all. We all need FOI but we have a lot to do if it is to
>> making meaning in our lives.
>>
>>
>>

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