Jakarta – Law and media experts agreed Thursday that a freedom of information law – not yet passed – should cover state-owned companies, but with some exceptions.

Frans Hendra Winarta of the Indonesian Law Commission said there were two reasons why state-owned companies should be included in the bill.

First, the establishment and function of state-owned companies was regulated by law; and second, state-owned companies were managing public funds – whether from the state budget, the regional budget or non-budgetary funds, he told experts gathered to discuss the public's right to access official information.

However, he said, certain classes of information might properly remain secret, such as information relating to intellectual property rights and trade secrets, competition strategies, transfer of assets and currency by the state and state-linked investment or business expansion plans.

On the same occasion, Agus Sudibyo from the Coalition of Public Information Freedom said the inclusion of state-owned companies was only one of four major problems with the bill that is expected to become law in January 2008.

First, he said, as regards the misuse of information the bill doesn't define "mistreatment" and "misleading".

Second, the mechanism for the establishing a special "information commission" and determining the composition of its members was unclear. Third, the specific companies and categories of information that would constitute exceptions to the transparency mandate hadn't been determined.

Finally, he said, exceptions applicable in the case of national defense and security matters were also yet to be agreed on.

He said these problems had delayed the passage of the bill. "The bill should be ready this month.

The main source of problems is that the government is taking a very conservative position on the idea of public information freedom and accountability." Another speaker at the discussion, Bambang Harymurti of Tempo magazine, said the problems couldn't be solved simply by revising the language of individual provisions of the law.

Most important, he said, was the question of how to make sure the bill was in agreement with basic democratic principles.

"We should always remember the main aim of the bill is to strengthen the people's sovereignty." Bambang said research studies conducted by experts – among others Amartya Sen, Joseph Stiglitz and James D.

Wolfensohn – revealed that countries with high incomes also enjoyed a relatively free flow of information. "It can be said that all of the world experts have agreed that access to information is significant in reducing poverty," he said. (uwi)