My heartfelt greetings to our fellow champions and advocates of open government and good governance, especially to our partners from Civil Society Organizations!
Assalamu alaikum wa Raḥmatullahi wa Barakatuh.
Welcome to the 6th Philippine Open Government (PH-OGP) National Action Plan Development Workshop.
As we all know, we have been preparing action plans to pursue increased and better participation in OGP. These action plans are the product of a co-creation process in which government and civil society jointly develop commitments to open government reforms.
Successful OGP action plans focus on significant domestic open government priorities and ambitious reforms. These are relevant to the values of transparency, accountability, and public participation, and contain specific, time-bound, and verifiable commitments.
But in all of these, I believe that the key to the success of our action plans and unlocking the future of open government is YOU—our partners from civil society. Through OGP, you strengthen the power that you hold in shaping our country’s open government agenda.
As a matter of fact, the new OGP Strategy 2023 to 2028 has highlighted that there can be no open government without a free civil society and that OGP is an “equal partnership between the government and civil society.”
Tayo po ay magkapantay at magkaagapay sa layuning maging bukas ang ating bukas. Buksan natin ang pinto sa isa't isa upang sama-sama nating mapaunlad ang ating bansa dahil tayo po ay mas malakas kapag tayo ay nagkakaisa.
It is for this reason that I would like to commend all of you for your enthusiastic participation in this undertaking. Together with your government counterparts, you have made significant steps in laying the foundation for open governance in the Philippines. And as we embark on the second phase of the co-creation process of our 6th National Action Plan, I hope that you will continue to do so through this National Action Plan Development Workshop and beyond.
More importantly, I call on you, our dear participants, to seize this opportunity to push for accountability in our government, amplify our collective impact in driving change, sharpen the narrative by bringing our open government reforms and initiatives closer to the people, and finally take up space and create space for our fellow Filipinos.
Let us make this workshop as fruitful and as purposeful as can be so that together, we can transcend beyond action plans and execute, monitor, and evaluate our programs and projects that genuinely open the government to the people.
Maraming salamat po. Mabuhay ang OGP at bawat Pilipino!
Wabillahi Tawfiq Wal Hidaya, Wasalamu alaikum wa rahmatullahi wa Barakatuhu.
