OGP in the News – Week of September 26, 2016

A series providing a round-up of media attention received by the Open Government PartnershipThe Open Government Partnership (OGP) is a multi-stakeholder initiative focused on improving government transparency, ensuring opportunities for citizen participation in public matters, and strengthen... More throughout the world.

This week, OGP news came out of six of the seven continents (sorry Australia).

Uruguay’s Taringa, Terra in the United States, Mexico and Argentina, and Colombia’s Caracol Radio all broadcasted Uruguay’s participation in this year’s OGP Global Summit in Paris. Multiple articles quoted President of Uruguay Tabare Vazquez describing the country as an “example of closeness [to the people]” and documented Uruguay’s progress toward fulfilling the 2030 Sustainable Development Agenda endorsed by OGP’s Steering Committee at the 2015 United Nations General Assembly. Also in South America, numerous Spanish-speaking news platforms, including Argentina’s La Nacion, Spain’s El Diario, and the United States’ Terra, announced that Argentina will be hosting the 2017 OGP regional summit.

In France, meanwhile, Libération ran an article about the impact of civic tech on democracy, suggestingthat OGP’s Global Summit in Paris could represent an opportunity to highlight this growing sector, particularly in France. To this effect, Orange Actualités and La Tribune Toulouse reported that two Toulouse-based, civic tech startups Politizr and Equivote plan to capitalize on the OGP Summit to host an event on December 7 (the first day of the Summit) in Toulouse for those looking to change politics through technology. Additionally, French television channel France 3 reported that Secretary of Public Administration Anna Yannick is to accompany Secretary of State Jean-Vincent Placé to Dijon on September 29 where they will attend a regional workshop focused on fulfilling commitments laid out in France’s National Action PlanAction plans are at the core of a government’s participation in OGP. They are the product of a co-creation process in which government and civil society jointly develop commitments to open governmen... (NAP) around open dataBy opening up data and making it sharable and reusable, governments can enable informed debate, better decision making, and the development of innovative new services. Technical specifications: Polici... and transparencyAccording to OGP’s Articles of Governance, transparency occurs when “government-held information (including on activities and decisions) is open, comprehensive, timely, freely available to the pub... More.

An article run by Nigerian daily The Punch quoted Special Adviser to the President on Judicial Reforms Juliet Ibekaku about how OGP figures into the nation’s effort to be more accountable:

Nigeria is at a point in time where we are striving very hard to be more transparent and accountable, not just to the outside world but to our citizens. And part of that goal that we seek to achieve this is what led Nigeria to be part of the Open Government Partnership Initiative.

Both the Global News Network of Liberia and African news aggregator AllAfrica.com covered remarks made by Liberian Deputy Information Minister and Senior Policy Coordinator of OGP in Liberia Andrew Tempeh during  meetings in the United States. Among the challenges faced by OGP, Tempeh listed financial support and awareness of OGP among both citizens and policy-makers. He also made several recommendations for OGP moving forward, including a “fully-staffed OGP Implementation Support UnitThe OGP Support Unit is a small, permanent group of staff that work closely with the Steering Committee and the Independent Reporting Mechanism to advance the goals of the Open Government Partnership....” and “technical assistance for capacity buildingEnhancing the skills, abilities, and processes of public servants, civil society, and citizens is essential to achieving long-lasting results in opening government. Technical specifications: Set of ac....”  

In other news, Indonesia’s Jawa Pos National Network documented the administration of President Joko Widodo’s advances in e-government as a means of bolstering the OGP pillars of transparency, accountability and responsiveness.

And finally Canadian news outlet Newsroom Ontario announced that, as part of its commitment to OGP’s subnational pilot program, the province will be conducting a public vote to generate ideas about how to make Ontario “most transparent and digitally-connected government in Canada.” In other words, Canadians of Ontario are encouraged to temporarily cease their fishing and moose-hunting in favor of sharing their most ingenious OpenGov ideas here!

Of course, we can’t catch everything in our news round-ups, so if you see we’ve missed something or think a particular story ought to be featured, please send it to jacqueline.mcgraw@opengovpartnership.org.