Sunday Times 2
Strengthening journalism to advance democracies; Information as a public good
The Sri Lanka Press Institute (SLPI) marks World Press Freedom Day on May 3, 2021 in concurrence with UNESCO’s commemoration of 30 years of the Windhoek Declaration under the theme “Information as a Public Good”.
The completion of 30 years of the landmark Windhoek Declaration for the development of free independent and pluralistic press also sheds light on our own roadmap declaration for media freedom in Sri Lanka, the Colombo Declaration of Media Freedom and Social Responsibility of 1998.
Members of the panel from left to right, Row 1 - Yashvardhan Kumar Sinha, Chief Information Commissioner, Central Information Commission, New Delhi, India, Kishali Pinto Jayawardena Commissioner, Right to Information Commission of Sri Lanka, Ashwini Natesan, Independent researcher and advocate. Row 2 - Shyamlal Yadav, Senior Editor, The Indian Express, Jayantha Fernando, Director, Sri Lanka CERT and General Counsel, ICTA, M Sridhar, former Commissioner, Central Information Commission of India, Panel moderator, Waruna Karunatilake, journalist.
This year’s theme revolves around affirming the importance of information enhancing media information and literacy to defend and demand journalism as a vital part of information as a public good. In seeking to advance professionalism in journalism and promote media freedom under the theme; “Strengthening Journalism to Advance Democracies; Information as a Public Good” the SLPI recognises reliable information as key to forge collective aspirations of better democracies.
In echoing this message, the SLPI and the Pathfinder Foundation are jointly hosting a webinar on Right to Information to coincide with World Press Freedom Day, reiterating the importance of access to information as a public good.
The six-member panel comprising Mr Yashvardhan Kumar Sinha, Chief Information Commissioner, Central Information Commission, India, Ms Kishali Pinto-Jayawardena, Commissioner, Right to Information Commission of Sri Lanka, Mr Shyamlal Yadav, Senior Editor, The Indian Express, Ms Ashwini Natesan, Independent researcher and advocate, Mr Jayantha Fernando, Director, Sri Lanka CERT and General Counsel, ICTA, and Prof M Sridhar, former Commissioner, Central Information Commission of India will talk of the following areas, ‘Gains of the present, priorities for the future’ , ‘Implementing RTI: Development priorities and exposing corruption’ and ‘RTI; Privacy and data protection’ . The panel will be moderated by journalist, Mr Waruna Karunatilake.
The webinar will be held on the Zoom platform on May 3, at 3.30 PM. More details are available on the SLPI website at www.slpi.lk or on Facebook or twitter.