In the summer of 2019, journalists from Sudan, El Salvador, Cambodia and Moldova engaged in a new fight for access to information. Why are we on the same list? It’s not because these states have an association agreement with the European Union, they simply face similar problems of corruption and transparency. In Sudan, after protests that led to the fall of dictator Omar al-Bashir, journalists called on the new authorities to review the Law on Access to Information. Cambodian authorities promise to adjust the law this September, boasting that the UN and UNESCO recommendations were taken into account when drafting the new normative act.

In El Salvador, the situation is pretty much the same as it was in Moldova before June: leader Nayib Bukele does not give any interviews to investigative reporters, but uses several channels, including social networks, to promote his own point of view, without accepting the need and the obligation to answer questions, especially the uncomfortable ones.

Today, the situation is a little different in Moldova, but it is still far from being as it should be. This year, investigative reporters from Moldova mark a decade of struggle for access to electronic databases. It’s a continuous fight, with battles won, then lost, then won again, then compromised, then starting again from the beginning.

1991-2009. Personal visits, requests on paper

At that time, the databases needed for journalistic work were not online. If a reporter needed to know who a particular company belongs to, he had to personally go to the State Registration Chamber, submit a handwritten application, indicating what he wanted to know. The reporter also had to leave his personal data and pay a sum of money. Within a few days, the reporter returned and picked up the information printed on paper. After 2009, we began to believe in an imminent democracy, which, combined with new technologies, would have ensured transparency. Until then, it was almost non-existent.

2010-2011. The first electronic databases

In the 2000s, the statements of wealth of civil servants were under the care of the Central Control Commission of the Declaration of Incomes and Property, created in 2002 and controlled by Vladimir Voronin, Moldova’s former President. That year ZdG wrote dozens of messages to all the authorities, to the leaders of the new government. In a few years the National Integrity Authority (ANI) created an online portal to access the declarations. 

2012-2014. Online access to the State Registration Chamber (CIS), Cadaster, and the court portal

ZdG requested non-stop online access to the databases of the State Registration Chamber, as well as of the Cadaster. And we got it! Official contracts with these institutions followed, along with monthly fees and fees for each company accessed. It was not easy to pay these amounts, but it was revolutionary to be able to access the databases online, without having reporters go visit the institutions. The investigative press then launched a series of reports on the palaces, luxury houses and buildings of the dignitaries.

I still remember that ZdG series of investigative reports. It started with the house of Anatolie Donciu, the first head of National Integrity Authority. In fact, it was not particularly the Cadaster or State Registration Chamber database that was used to produce the material. Rather, it was the reporter’s curiosity and public interest. Yet, without these databases, the integrity issues of civil servants would never have been properly addressed.

The investigative journalists were curious so they accessed the databases, resulting in hundreds of articles and reports published by ZdG, RISE Moldova, the Center for Journalistic Investigations, other portals and TV channels on abuses, conflicts of interest and money laundering, involving parliamentarians, state presidents, ministers, judges, prosecutors, the Metropolitan archbishop, bishops, mayors and party leaders. Without such materials, Moldova would have looked even darker. But there is one more thing: these materials would not have been possible if not for the payments made by the editorial offices to the state treasury for access to the databases. These costs would have been difficult to pay without the support external partners offered to the newsrooms.

2015-2019. Limited access to databases, bigger loss of money and time

This is a period painted black in the Book of access to information in Moldova. In January 2015, we were informed by the State Registration Chamber that the price for accessing company information had increased by 100 percent. Although we made numerous requests, asking for economic arguments and answers to the question: why is public information sold to journalists at double prices? We have yet to receive any answer. Generally, this was the year when the policy of ignoring the press started, when the authorities chose to leave questions from investigative journalists unanswered. In a few months, the search engine for companies and owners from State Registration Chamber was shut down. 

Then some search options were removed, for example a search by patronymic can no longer be done, even up to the present day. Then came the decision to subordinate these institutions to the Public Services Agency. Higher costs and more difficult procedures followed. The reporters had to return to the old procedure, and walk to the Agency with power of attorney and stamp, file an application, wait for several days, check payments, face delays, stay in queues, etc. 

My colleague Anatolie Eșanu summarized a case of requesting information from the Public Services Agency: “four days of work lost and 46 euros (896 lei) for six A4 sheets and some notes.” Any investigative journalist will confirm that obtaining data from some registers does not in the least mean getting accurate information about fraud. Investigative work means hundreds of pages of verified documents to obtain confirmation of abuse.

The difficulties did not end here. Recently, the Public Services Agency has decided to complicate matters further. Mold-street promptly explains how, obtaining public information has become practically impossible.

During the same period, the search engine on the court page changed structure. Then, the court decisions were depersonalized in an abusive manner, using an un-named procedure, to hide the court’s decisions, names etc. Protests were organized to restore some access to these decisions.

At the same time, the statements of income and assets curated by National Integrity Authority remained “unscanned” for several years, because of the institution’s inabilities and transformations that took too long.

We didn’t give up, we kept fighting. There have been countless meetings and commissions with officials from the Government, the Parliament, the Public Services Agency, and all of them together. It was clear there was no political will, as different pretexts were invoked and the databases became increasingly inaccessible.

The dissatisfaction of the reporters was even greater now that, despite the little victories won after a decade of struggle for electronic access to databases, they had to go back to rock bottom. It has become even more difficult to tolerate opacity. 

July 2019. The fight continues.

 As soon as the new government was installed, we sent them a letter with the following content: “We request that investigation journalists be provided with access to information, to the databases. Note that by 2015 access to some databases was easier and cheaper, then prices were drastically raised and search engines were redone, with limitations in identifying information.”

1. The State Registration Chamber (reorganized by merger with the Public Services Agency)

a. Online access

• We have online access only to information about the founders, the declared fields of activity, data from the annual financial report. This information costs 1, 2.56 or 5 euros (20, 50 or 100 lei). In 2015, the prices were doubled without justification and without answering the journalists’ requests to explain and offer discounts.
• Since that time, the information about the founders of a company no longer includes the patronymic of the people, a limitation that often creates confusion (there may be several managers of companies with the same name and surname). This can sometimes lead to regrettable mistakes and the attribution of a company to a person who is unrelated to it.

b. Offline access: information about the company history and the procedure for acquiring the file

• In order to receive the history of the legal entity or of the individual entrepreneur, we must pay 12.55 euros (245 lei) per company, go to the Public Services Agency headquarters and write an application on paper. The requested information is released in three days. We can neither request information nor obtain information online. 
• Familiarization, at the Public Services Agency headquarters, with the documents in the file of the legal person or the individual entrepreneur costs 11.58 euros (226 lei) per company. This service is vital for investigative journalists. But there are huge difficulties, as the costs are too high and the procedures are extremely difficult.  

If we pay by transfer, we must first go to the Public Services Agency headquarters on 42 Pushkin Street in downtown Chișinău to take a verification document (proof that we have money in the account / transferred to the Agency – even if the money was transferred to them a few months before). 

Then we go back to their headquarters on 42 Pushkin Street, downtown Chișinău bringing with us the verification document, the power of attorney, the proof that we are registered as a personal data operator, a passport, an identification card, and write a request for familiarization with the file.

The file is only offered to us on the third day at the Public Services Agency headquarters.

After studying it, if we find something useful, we ask for copies of certain pages (proxies, sales-purchase agreements, etc.), which again cost money and another three days until we receive them.

2. Cadaster (reorganized by merger with Public Services Agency)

Presently, access is allowed if paid: 12.29 euros (240 lei) per month with a limited number of visits (200). But this database has limitations. In some Eureopean Union countries, as well as in Ukraine, access to cadastral information is not restricted to search by address. There, journalists can look for all the properties of a person or company. This is impossible in Moldova.

We have also presented a list of requirements to meet. For example, how the databases should work in the best interest of the citizens and journalists, as well as the fact that government authorities should be at the service of the citizens. 

In addition, we have a request, which we want to make public: access to information is a constitutional right and confirmed by international acts ratified by the Republic of Moldova. We ask the authorities of this state to provide easy access, with minor or no payments and with indestructible access mechanisms. Those who violate access to information should be punished. We want real penalties for violating a constitutional right. And we will fight for this right.

Alina RADU, alina.radu@zdg.md