The Executive Council of the Access to Public Information Unit urged the Municipality of Colonia to comply with the legal deadlines for responding to requests for information, after not responding to a request for Centennial Newspaper (Soriano) about the results of the administrative investigation and audit that the Mayor of Colonia, Dr. Carlos Moreira, promised to find out how the public treasury was affected, after the corruption case that ended with the Mayor of Florencio Sánchez, Alfredo Sánchez, in jail and dismissed by the Senate of the Republic.
On April 18 of this year, Centenario presented a request for access to information to the Municipality of Colonia, to know the results of the investigation that the departmental government carried out to find out the details of the corruption case in the Municipality of Florencio Sánchez.
The request states that “on September 28, 2021, the Legal Justice of the city of Rosario (Colonia) sentenced the now former Mayor of the city of Florencio Sánchez, Alfredo Sánchez, to three years in prison, two effective and one with probation, for crimes against the public administration, including fraud, conspiracy, concealment and ideological falsification. The Mayor of the department, Dr. Carlos Moreira, announced through the media “an immediate administrative investigation and in-depth audit” to determine the circumstances surrounding these events and establish how the public treasury was affected.”
Based on this, the Municipality of Colonia was requested:
“1) Copy of the results of both reports;
2) How much the public treasury of Florencio Sánchez and the department of Colonia was affected by the cases of corruption proven in the judicial ruling reported above;
3) What measures did or will the Municipality take to recover the affected assets;
4) Has any civil lawsuit been filed?
5) If the answer is affirmative, with whom this process was initiated. If negative, the reasons why this resource was not used;
6) What administrative provisions were established after this case, to improve the controls of the Municipality of Florencio Sánchez in particular and that of all the local governments of the department of Colonia in general.
7) Full copy of both reports, both from the administrative investigation and the audit in paper or digital format.”
The proposal was formally submitted to the departmental government on April 25, 2024 with file Nº2024/83001/04341. But the Municipality never responded. This lack of response led to the situation being reported to the Access to Public Information Unit (UAIP), a decentralized body of the Agency for the Development of the Government of Electronic Management and the Information and Knowledge Society (AGESIC). , which has among its tasks, controlling compliance with the Law on Access to Public Information (No. 18,381) and coordinating with all obligated subjects (including mayors) the policies aimed at facilitating information access and transparency.
The UAIP, after analyzing the complaint, transferred the proposal to the Municipality of Colonia, but the consultation was not resolved by the departmental government.
Given this procedure of the Municipality, the Access Unit prepared a legal report, which concluded that “the accused did not respond to the request for access to public information within the established deadlines, which is why the positive silence established by the regulations has been established. ”.
This “positive silence” establishes that, “once the period of twenty business days has expired from the presentation of the request, if no extension has been mediated or the same has expired without there being an express resolution notified to the interested party, the interested party may access the respective information, considering “the refusal of any official to provide it is serious.”
The resolution
The resolution accounts for the lack of response from the Municipality, so after it, it is in a position, as established by the Law, to initiate the pertinent legal actions to find the required information. The resolution states the following:
“ATTENTION: to the above and to the provisions of Law No. 18,381, of October 17, 2008; The Executive Council of the Access to Public Information Unit RESOLVES:
1. Indicate that, in the case, positive silence has been configured, due to lack of response in time to the request for information made.
2. Urge the Municipality of Colonia to maintain in all cases compliance with the legal deadline for responding to requests for information.
3. Inform the petitioner that, as stated in Article 22 of Law No. 18,381, the pertinent judicial actions are available.
4. “Be notified, published and, in a timely manner, archived.”
