LEGAL – PAIA&POPIA

PAIA AND POPIA

The Promotion of Access to Information Act (PAIA)

The right of access to information is a unique right within the South African Bill of Rights, and is more fully realised through the Promotion of Access to Information Act (PAIA). The PAIA seeks to promote the right of access to information as well as improve transparency and accountability within both the public and private sectors in order to realise South Africa’s goals of an open and participatory democracy.
The WRC is a public body as defined by the PAIA and is required to have processes in place to guide, accept and respond to requests for information that it holds.

Whilst all requests for information to the WRC will be addressed, not all requests for information will result in the requester receiving the requested information. The PAIA guides the type of information that can be provided, can be provided only with the consent of an interested third party, or cannot be provided. The types of requests to information that can easily be accommodated and provided are those which do not implications for the rights of third parties.

Please see the WRC PAIA Manual to assist with any request to information. (WRC Manual Link)

Amendment: Deputy Officers (Deputy Informtion Officers)

Please see the Form to be used when a request for information is to be submitted to the WRC (WRC Requestor Form Link)

Completed Requestor Forms, and any enquiries can be submitted to paia@wrc.org.za

 

POPIA: THE PROTECTION OF PERSONAL INFORMATION ACT, 2013 (POPIA COMPLIANCE MANUAL)

The Protection of Personal Information Act, 2013 (“POPIA”) promotes the protection of personal information of natural and juristic persons and sets the minimum requirements for the obtaining, processing, storing and destruction of personal information. POPIA is intended to balance two competing interests, namely (a) our individual constitutional rights to privacy (which requires our personal information to be protected); and (b) the needs of the WRC as a Schedule 3A public entity to have access to and to process (work with) personal information for legitimate business purposes.

As a legislated entity and good corporate citizen, the WRC takes its data subject’s privacy seriously, it respects the privacy of its Data Subjects, is open and transparent about how it obtains, processes, stores and destroys personal information and is committed to do what is legally required to ensure that all personal information it receives is adequately protected, is collected and used properly, lawfully and transparently.

In order to fulfil its mandate in terms of the Water Research Act, the WRC is required to publish content obtained through leverage and levy funded research projects. In this regard, the WRC embraces the free flow of information as a public service, in the public interest and to comply with its legislated mandate.

To this end the WRC has developed a POPIA Compliance Manual which sets out the framework for the WRC’s compliance with POPIA. (WRC POPIA Compliance Manual Link)

This manual is intended to promote the right to privacy as enshrined in the Constitution, while at the same time protecting the flow of information and advancing the right of access to and protection of information as provided for by POPIA.

Where reference is made to the “processing” of personal information, this will include any activity in which the information is worked with, from the time that the information is collected, up to the time that the information is destroyed, regardless of whether the information is worked with manually, or by automated systems.

(POPIA Forms Links)