The Commissioner for Information of Public Importance and Personal Data Protection Rodoljub Sabic has submitted The Initiative for Amending the Law on Public Administration to the Ministry of Human and Minority Rights, Public Administration and Local Self-Government. The Commissioner has initiated that this law should be complemented with the provisions according to which the electronic presentations of the authorities become an obligation, as well as to set accordingly the implementation of these provisions to local self-government authorities, agencies and public enterprises, and to regulate by the law the sanctions for infringement of this obligation.
Estimating that the request for obligatory internet presentations of the authorities is completely in accordance with their obligation to inform the public about their work, the Commissioner has also said:
“The situation in this field is the result of certain anachronistic opinions when it comes to the relation between the government and the public. We live in the time which is, not without the reason, called “the information age” and the electronic presentations of the authorities on the Internet had to be recognized and institutionalized long time ago as the efficient and for some time now inexpensive way to fulfill the obligation that the government has towards the public.
Although, bearing in mind the situation around us, this way of communication with the public should be completely normal even without formal obligation that is still not the case. For example, on the Republic level more than one third of the bodies does not have the official electronic presentation. One fourth of the Ministries and Administrations does not have a web site, out of 12 Government Services almost half, that is 5 also do not have a web site, out of 29 Administrative Districts, 13 do not have a web site. It is necessary for the citizens to be able to find, in an easy way, all the information they need on the Internet site of the body (the body data, contact information, regulations, news, documents, information booklet, budget, public procurements, competitions…) and not to obtain all the information with problems, very often after the Commissioner for Information has intervened.
The access to all the information is the right of the public, the right the realization of which should not depend on someone’s good will. In the second decade of the 21st century the Internet is, or at least has to be, one of the preferred ways of exercising that right. Bearing in mind that many, unfortunately, still do not recognize that fact, it is obviously necessary to set it as a legal duty for the authorities to have a web presentation.”
