Implementation of Transitional Laws in Serbia 2006

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Implementation of Transitional Laws in Serbia 2006the Council of Europe 100 . The solution accepted in the new Constitutionleads to the narrowing of the right to objection of conscience, achieved inboth the legislature and practice, which is strictly forbidden in the field ofhuman rights.Right to InformationArticle 51Everyone shall have the right to be informed accurately, fully and timely about issues of publicimportance. The media shall have the obligation to respect this right.Everyone shall have the right to access information kept by state bodies and organizationswith delegated public powers, in accordance with the law.The right to free access of information has been renamed in the newConstitution as the right to be informed. The creators of the Constitutiondid not explicate why they have changed the name of this right. In additionto the name, the substance of the right has been changed as well. In theLaw of the Free Access to Information of Public Importance one can findthe following definition:Everyone shall be entitled to be informed as to whether a government agency possesses aspecific piece of information of public import, and/or whether it is otherwise accessibleto him.Everyone shall be entitled to have an information of public import accessible to him, byenabling him to have an insight into the document containing the piece of information ofpublic import, the right to a copy of such document, as well as the right to be sent, at therequest, a copy of the document by mail, telex, electronic mail or in some other way. 101In addition to a broader definition of the obligations of the governmentalbodies, even those bodies are defined by the Law as much broader than inthe Constitution. Thus, the Law states that the following are consideredgovernmental bodies:1) a public agency, a territorial autonomy agency, a local self-government agency, as wellas organizations entrusted with carrying out public powers (hereinafter: public agency);100 More on this in the book by the Lawyers’ Committee for Human Rights: Objection of Conscience, Belgrade,2000101 Law on free access to information, Article 5, see above under 328
Implementation of Transitional Laws in Serbia 20062) a legal entity established or financed, in its entirety and/or predominantly, by a publicagency. 102According to Constitution, everyone has the right to the access to dataowned by state bodies and organizations which are entrusted with publicauthorizations. There is no word about the bodies of territorial autonomynor local self-governance or legal entity set up or backed up by a state body.In this way, already reached level of right to free access to information isextremely lowered.Also, the Commissioner had not been made a constitutional category, unlikethe ombudsman 103 . According to the Constitutional law, it is regulated thatthe newly elected members of the Parliament will, during the first session,coordinate with the Constitution the laws which regulate the Protector ofcitizens and the realization of the right of the citizens to be informed andelect the Protector of citizens, the organ responsible for monitoring therealization of the right of the citizens to be informed, the President of theNational Bank of Serbia and the organs of the State revisory institution 104 .There is no need to coordinate the law on free access to information withthe Constitution, so the intention of the framers of the law is not clear.Furthermore, „the organ responsible for monitoring the right of thecitizens to be informed”, as the Constitution calls it, already exists. His titleis the Commissioner for information of public significance and accordingto the law his term lasts for seven years. A question arises why the lawanticipates the election of this organ. There are objective indications thatthe Government wants to significantly narrow the authorizations of thecommissioner or to cancel it as an institution, and possibly name a neworgan which would monitor a so far non-existent „right of the citizens to beinformed”. Another function of the commissioner is not only to monitorthe realization of the right of free access to information, but also to protectit. By such an act the accomplished rights would be diminished, which isforbidden both by the international regulations, and the Constitution ofSerbia 105 .Nongovernmental organizations Center for the Advanced Legal Studies102 Ibid, Article 3103 Ibid, Article 131104 Constitutional Law for the implementation of Constitution of Serbia, adopted November 10 th , 2006, OfficialGazetta of RS, number 98/06, Article 5105 Constitution of Serbia, Article 20, see above under 729
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Implementation of Transitional Laws in Serbia 2006

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