Transparency and SDG business

By now, the few of us with an interest in the development game and all its associated intrigues, would have closely monitored the contributions of world leaders (those who cared to turn up) at the UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) Summit on Monday and Tuesday and come to a variety of conclusions.

Official lobbying of media to integrate SDG aspirations into our news agendas has been extensive. Almost everywhere, governments and inter-governmental institutions have kept asking: “What are you doing to report on the SDGs?” I hope they know what they are asking for.

The global bodies with which I am associated – the Global Forum for Media Development (GFMD) and International Freedom of Expression Exchange (now known simply as IFEX) – have long included the subject as part of our programmes of work, and media everywhere have, to varying degrees, kept the subject alive.

To the human rights community, this has been the case since early lobbying by members of these organisations on provisions of the SDGs focused heavily on some important dynamics associated with rights – freedom of expression and access to information among them.

The SDG Summit was thus keenly followed by many of us, not only as part of our monitoring of the 17 goals, but as people with a special interest in  progress with SDG 16.

This goal speaks about the need to “promote peaceful and inclusive societies for sustainable development, provide access to justice for all and build effective, accountable and inclusive institutions at all levels.”

This is fancy language on which some organisations lobbied for specific “indicators” to empirically assess progress. Governments habitually bypass extensive reporting on this goal, if only because accompanying indicators tend to be unimpressive.

There were protracted tensions related to the indicators that measure SDG 16. Current measurements, for example, had to be negotiated and we were left with three specific “targets” that, on reflection, could have been more adequately elaborated.  

SDG Target 16.10, for instance, sets as a discrete aspiration, national conditions to “ensure public access to information and protect fundamental freedoms, in accordance with national legislation and international agreements.”

In the Caribbean, this is a specific shortcoming. This is so despite the adoption of the long-forgotten 1997 Caricom Charter of Civil Society – Article VIII of which speaks about Freedom of Expression and Access to Information.

Twenty-six years later, under half of the countries of Caricom have access to information laws (in the case of T&T, the Freedom of Information Act). And even where such laws exist there are identifiable shortcomings. For such a reason, the Media Institute of the Caribbean (MIC) operates an Access to Information (ATI) Help Desk and has developed an accompanying Advocacy Toolkit for journalists and civil society activists.

Under SDG 16.10.1, there is also a requirement to monitor and report on the “number of verified cases of killing, kidnapping, enforced disappearance, arbitrary detention and torture of journalists, associated media personnel, trade unionists and human rights advocates in the previous 12 months.”

Article 19, a leading global free expression organisation, has registered concern that while 16.10.1 is important it does not capture the full range of attacks on journalists and activists including strategic litigation, online harassment, and other forms of abuse. Neither does it seek to record impunity when such violations occur.

So, while within Caricom (with the exception of Haiti), murder, kidnapping and torture involving journalists are uncommon, there has been a growing tendency by states and other players to resort to other forms of attacks on journalists and journalism.

This is just one sidebar to the SDG story within Caricom. It is now eight years since its adoption at the United Nations “to end poverty, protect the planet, and ensure that by 2030 all people enjoy peace and prosperity.”

On Monday, UN Secretary-General, António Guterres, solemnly declared that “only 15 per cent of the targets are on track and many are going in reverse.” But while he reported positively on a US$500 billion “SDG Stimulus” to have some programmes executed, there is much that has been left undone my almost all of us.

The question of accountability and openness in the conduct of state business requires no considerable financial stimulus. Sadly, it’s not an area of achievement Caribbean countries were able to impressively report on in New York earlier this week. 

True, there are other urgent priorities that will be fully elaborated at the UN General Assembly this week, but transparency in the conduct of state business remains a persistent challenge. World leaders, including ours, promised much more.