Exercising Right to Information

Transparency and accountability require the acknowledgement and practicing of the right to information. We have wondered whether municipalities would respond to citizen applications to use their right to information, which is legally legitimate in Türkiye.

10 volunteers from Argüden Governance Academy’s Youth Network and 1 from Argüden Governance Academy have practiced their right to information in the case of requesting information from municipalities. Volunteers, primarily young people, emailed or contacted the municipal websites of 27 metropolitan municipalities run by elected mayors in Türkiye for information on the following questions:

• What kind of services are provided for the youth by … Metropolitan Municipality in 2021?
• How many citizens were targeted by these services?
• What is the amount of spendings from the municipal budget for these services?

Only 12 municipalities responded to the applications within the legally defined time period, i.e., 15 days, and with a relevant response, i.e., providing information that answers the applicants’ questions.

9 municipalities did not respond at all, and 1 municipality provided an irrelevant response within 15 days following the application.

5 municipalities responded after the time limit although some provided relevant and detailed information.

This exercise shows that citizens cannot use their right to information in a meaningful way. We see that many municipalities failed to respond to the applications despite their legal obligation to do so.

We should also note that some municipalities responded late yet in such a way that applicants were directly provided with relevant answers or with information on relevant sources and documents. As such, we conclude that institutional weaknesses and shortcomings should be assessed and improved for the use of the right to information which serves as an important tool of transparency and accountability.

We are grateful to all the volunteers for their efforts to contribute to our research:

Alara Erdoğan
Ali Emre Dikmen
Aybüke Köroğlu
Beyzanur Buruk
Erben Samet Arifoğlu
Mehtap Koçan
Osman Sarı
Sürücan Batmaz
Vahap Özdemir
Yakup Gözderesi
Yunus Emre Gültekin