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Sustainable development can hardly be achieved without access to information and participation by all citizens in national development. Easy access to information is a prerequisite for effective participation by citizens in matters that concern them. Similarly, it is important for citizens to seek and act upon information that will improve the quality of their lives. 

Assessing access to information
There are a number of situations that urges the need for easy access to information and are but not limited to the following. 

Recent reports in the local newspapers about poison scare by workers at Maloma’s Ferrovanadium Processing Plant advocates the need for access to information. Workers needed to know about hazards they were exposed to. Until and unless information is not easily made accessible to the workers they will continue to live in fear. Many of us could be in a similar situation. Do you know about the hazards that you are exposed to at your work place? The big question is have you cared to find out about these hazards? If you did, how difficult was it to obtain the information? Hazards in a working environment include among others safety hazards, physical hazards, ergonomic hazards and so on. 

Information relating to environmental, occupational health and safety standards is critical especially to the protection and prolonging of human immunity within the workplace. More often than not workers experience difficulties in accessing this and yet very crucial information from company authorities. They depend on representative bodies such as such labour unions, associations and committees etc. Where such groupings are either not allowed or suppressed it becomes even more difficult to access and or communicate information of concern to them. 

As a concerned citizen who is living side by side an industry that is releasing emissions into the air, I should be able to access information on the effects of these emissions to my health and the environment. 

The story of a primary school teacher who had a four-year-old asthmatic son could apply to you. Every day she would walk her son to the nursery school as he enjoyed it so much. By the time they reach school the boy was usually out of breath because he is asthmatic. One day the teacher collected her son from the nursery school and suddenly he had a very strong asthma attack and rushed him to the doctors for treatment. A few days later she read in the newspaper that air pollution levels were exceptionally high on that day. If she had known she would have prevented her son from the attack. She could not believe that the company authorities had not bothered to tell them. This is just but one of many examples of instances where information could have mitigated harm.

Section 35 of the Environment Management Act of 2002 compels any person who discharges or causes or permits the discharge of a contaminant into the environment in a manner or amount that is unlawful or that causes or is likely to cause an adverse effect to immediately inform the Authority; and to take all practical steps to contain the discharge and to avoid, mitigate and or/remedy the adverse effects resulting from the discharge, including removing any deposit.  In the example above, the company should have informed the responsible Authority and affected parties and taken measures to avoid harm.

Public authorities such as the Swaziland Environment Authority (SEA) has a duty to collect information from private parties or any other groups whose activities could significantly affect the environment. Moreover, in a case of an imminent threat to human health or the environment, all information, which could enable the public to take measures to prevent or mitigate harm arising from the threat, should be disseminated immediately. 

Section 217 (1) of the National Draft Constitution advocates that it is a constitutional responsibility of every citizen to promote the protection of the environment for the present and future generations. In view of the above access to information becomes critical as it may allow one to exercise his or her constitutional responsibility. 

Many of us do not know and or understand legal instruments relating to environmental issues in Swaziland let alone responsibilities that come from them. The Environment Management Act of 2002 and Water Act of 2003 are two very important environment legal instruments that were recently enacted. How many of us know and or understand the purpose of these legal tools? Whose responsibility is it anyway to make this information accessible? 

Information should not only be available and disseminated, but it should also be provided in a transparent manner and be effectively accessible. Information on these and other environment legal instruments will be discussed in this column.