Information Bill for Parliament soon - Zita

Accra, March 16, GNA - Mrs. Sabah Zita Okaikoi, Minister of Information, on Monday hinted that the Right to Information Bill will go before Parliament soon since a lot of the things that needed to be rectified had been done.

She therefore urged Members of Parliament to support the Bill when it appeared before the House to get the Bill operational as soon as possible.

Mrs. Okaikoi said this when members of the Parliamentary Select Committee on Communication paid a courtesy on her to formally introduce themselves and get to know her plans and programmes for the information sector.

The visit by the Select Committee is a routine one done when a new sector Minister is appointed because the select committee has oversight responsibility over the budget and other activities of the Ministry. Mrs Okaikoi said the Cinematography Bill would also go before Parliament to streamline programmes that were shown on television to suit our cultural and traditional beliefs.

"A lot of things showing on TV these days are making us lose our culture as a people," she said, and advised that TV stations showed educational programmes during the day time and pushed adult programmes further into the night.

She said the Ministry also had a programme to use the media to help educate people on environmental and sanitation issues as well as use the media to bring unity into the country.

The Minister specifically mentioned the Agbogbloshie and Bawku areas as worrying situations that her Ministry would use the media through drama and other programmes to educate people to accept that we are all one people.

Mrs Okaikoi urged members of the Select Committee to support the Ministry's budget to enable them to execute such programmes successfully.