The Institute for Development of Freedom of Information presented the final report “Access to Public Information by the Media: Legislation v. Reality”.

“Statistical Findings of Obtaining Information from Public Institutions.

- Only around 12% of journalists were able to obtain public information in full within the time limit stipulated by the law.
- In 50% of cases, the request for public information was not satisfied or remained unanswered. In the rest of the cases, public information was issued in full or in part.
- Excluding the cases where the request was left unanswered (about 25% of the applications), it took an average of 16 calendar days for a public institution to issue a response letter to the request.
- Administrative complaints are usually not satisfied, but in about 40% of cases it became possible to obtain the information in full, even as the complaint remained unresolved.
- In the case of the use of administrative complaints, it took an average of 35 calendar days to receive information.
- The courts have not made any decisions on the lawsuits filed within the framework of the project. It takes an average of 2.5 years to conclude a public information dispute in the general court system.
- The courts extended the standard term of court review by 5 months for 100% of the complaints received in the proceedings, citing the special complexity of the disputes (including cases in which the administrative body did not respond to the public information request or the administrative complaint at all).

Substantive Sindings: Systemic Problems of Obtaining Public Information by the Media

- Public institutions, in most cases, either violated the deadlines for providing public information stipulated by the legislation of Georgia or left public information requests unanswered.
- Oftentimes, public institutions provide the requested information in an incomplete form and do not justify why the requested information is not provided, which hinders the proper use of the right to appeal.
- There is a different approach in considering administrative complaints across public institutions. Some public institutions do not consider administrative complaints and believe that they should be appealed only in court.
- Practice indicates that, in order to effectively obtain public information, knowledge of the relevant field/business process and/or legal assistance is required. This is mainly due to the strictly formal assessment of the content of the request by public institutions.
- The project identified cases where public institutions indicate that they do not process information in the requested form and do not provide information in the forms as it is stored in the public institution.
- In some cases, public institutions do not provide information based on legal arguments that are not derived from the law.
- The practice of “redacting information” is necessary to ensure the proportionality of restrictions on the right to receive public information, although this practice is only applicable to public information containing personal data.
- There are problematic public institutions that do not respond at all to public information requests or to corresponding complaints”, - reads the report.